Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Goro Akechi rises from the depths of unconsciousness slowly and in a muggy, confused daze. Every single inch of him feels lethargic. Sluggish. Like he's been treading water.

Or syrup.

…

Did he hit his head?

…

Perhaps he's come down with a fever?

Either way, he can already feel the start of a headache coming on, and waking up feels like the absolute last thing he wants to be doing right now. So he tries to chase the drowsiness — to catch it before it can slip away entirely — hoping to sink back into that easy, blissful unawareness...

But then, he moves, or something moves, and he jerks awake reflexively before he can fall forwards and out of the chair he's sitting in.

The plush, wing-back chair he's sitting in.

For some reason.

Lightheadedness washes over him in a warm, muddy wave, and leaves him swaying dizzily in his seat, head lolling back against the cushioned fabric behind him.

Goro closes his eyes again. Opens them.

He's still in the chair.

Great.

The first little pinpricks of fear scuttle up and down his spine, and he knows he has to get some kind of handle on what the fuck is going on here, even as the gears in his brain continue to grind uselessly against whatever it is that's obstructing them.

He forces himself to look around, through bleary, unfocused eyes. The room he's found himself in is bare, dingy — nothing more than a painted, concrete cube, really — but there's a familiar shimmer in the air, like a mirage that might disappear if you try to look directly at it.

Then the room itself seems to shudder, and faint images of ornate picture frames overlay the blank walls for a second — massive ones, similar to what he remembers from Madarame's Palace — before fading out of existence again.

A safe room…?

The floor underneath his feet blinks and morphs again (from cracked cement into blue and white tile this time), as if to prove the point.

Perhaps it should come as a relief, to have some idea of where he might be, but it still doesn't feel right — doesn't feel like he's in the Metaverse at all, in fact… even though that must be where he is.

Where else would the walls around him stutter and flicker in and out of existence like this?

A safe room, however, typically stabilises after a couple of seconds, while this room continues to cycle as if it can't seem to settle on one form. In just a handful of seconds (and even in his addled state), he picks out parts of what looks like an office, a bar, a prison, an elevator, and bizarrely, the interior of a high-end limousine.

And everything in between.

The only consistency he can find, other than the chair he's sitting in, is the colour. Everything he's seen has been blue — a shade of blue that feels familiar in a way that he can't quite put his finger on. Goro tries to concentrate, to pursue that dim flicker of recognition, but he's almost overcome by a dizzying swell of vertigo instead, hands spasming and grasping at the arms of the blue chair, knuckles white as his fingers dig into the velvet upholstery. The feeling is uneven and a little strange, and dimly, he registers that it's because one of his gloves is missing.

Panic bubbles in his gut and up into his throat, adrenaline surging as his fight or flight instinct kicks in, but it's futile. There are no physical restraints holding him in place, but that doesn't seem to matter. He can't get up out of this chair, or do much of anything, except claw uselessly at the fabric under his fingers again.

After a few fruitless attempts, he has to accept that he can't summon a Persona either.

Hereward is just as silent as Loki and Robin Hood.

Shit!

Shit, shit, shit!

No.

He needs to calm down.

Every second he loses to the fear and the dread trying to take hold of him could mean the difference between life and death, and he needs to get his shit together.

So he closes his eyes again, shutting out the information overload from his constantly shifting environment, and tries desperately to string a coherent thought together.

The adrenaline coursing through him might have done nothing to help him get to his feet, but it has cleared his head slightly, enough that when he grits his teeth and puts everything he has into focusing, he manages to grasp and pull at the dangling thread of his most recent memory. A few blurry images come back to him (Maruki's Palace, fighting a Persona the size of a building, and the reluctant pride he'd felt as Joker shot it right in its stupid fucking face), and, finally, some of the pieces click back into place.

The last thing he knows for certain is that he fought and won, working together with the Phantom Thieves to destroy Maruki's warped reality.

The warped reality that his very existence was supposed to be dependent on.

…

Isn't he supposed to be dead?

Eyes snapping back open at the thought, Goro's reward is another twist of alarm in his gut when he realises that he's not alone anymore.

Biting the inside of his cheek is the only thing that stops the undignified yelp that tries to escape from his mouth. If nothing else, the sharp little jolt of pain helps to ground him while he tries to understand what he's looking at.

Mercifully, the surrounding area has settled to some degree; now just appearing as a dark and nondescript box that's so murky and blurry around the edges, it's next to impossible to tell how large the space actually is.

There is a dim light in the centre of the room, at least. Illuminating the wooden desk that is now in front of him.

And sitting behind that desk is the strangest old man that Goro's ever seen.

That itchy sense of almost recognition gets worse as he takes in the bulging, bloodshot eyes and ridiculously long nose on the man's face. An appearance so extreme, and so wrong, that even if their surroundings were normal, this unnerving old man would be more than enough proof that this isn't the real world.

"Welcome to the Velvet Room," the man says, gesturing with one of his too-long arms at the unstable space around them. His voice sounds surprisingly kind and wizened, and it should probably be reassuring, but it only serves to put Goro even more on edge. "I am Igor. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"Wha—" Goro tries, but his voice is shaky and small in a way that makes him sound years younger than his actual age — which is unacceptable, and he has to swallow, hard, before he can try again. "What— where is this?

"This place exists between dream and reality, mind and matter," the old man replies. As if that's actually an explanation.

The room's appearance shifts once more, and suddenly there are impossibly tall windows behind the desk. The bright blue light pouring through them is as intense and blinding as it is abrupt, leaving Goro squinting like he just emerged from the darkness of a cellar and out into the midday sun. Not so much that he doesn't clock the row of figures looming behind the man's desk, though. He counts four silhouettes of varying heights before the windows are gone again, and they disappear back into the gloom.

That panicky, animal fear tries to take hold of him again, but he has a better handle on it now, and it's immediately crushed under the boot heel of his anger.

Nothing enrages him more than feeling lost and powerless.

Anger is good. Familiar. The feeling of it burning under his skin is almost a comfort.

"Why am I here?" he tries again, and his voice comes out stronger this time.

The old man doesn't answer, just raises one gloved hand (Goro can't help but notice how his fingers are also far too long and unpleasantly spidery) to wave someone forward.

All four figures step out from the shadows behind the old man in unison, flanking his desk on either side. And now that he can finally get a proper look at them, Goro finds himself thrown for a loop, all over again, by the sheer strangeness of the situation.

Standing to the right-hand side of the desk is a serious-looking young man, wearing what appears to be a bellhop uniform, of all things. One of his hands is held behind his back, deferentially, and the other is resting on the shoulder of the little girl standing beside him. It's hard to say for sure, but she looks to be no older than eight years of age, and dressed in the same strangely dated way.

The butterfly barrettes in her hair sparkle prettily in the dim light.

There's a snag then — a tug — in his mind, and he realises that it's recognition! Some actual fucking progress! But as second after bewildered second passes, and that spark of recognition fails to catch, it becomes increasingly clear that exactly where he remembers this girl from, and even just her name, has escaped him entirely...

Because his brain actually working the way it's supposed to would be too fucking easy, apparently, instead of just sitting between his ears like useless mush.

Pushing past his frustration, he forces his attention back to the (for lack of a better term) people in front of him.

On the opposite side of the desk are two women, and he finds himself regarding them with even more suspicion — some deep, animal instinct tells him he needs to be wary of the pair of them, in particular.

The taller of the two is the picture of elegance, dressed in a more timeless fashion than the other beings here, her long wavy hair coiffed to perfection. There's something about her gentle expression that reminds Goro painfully of his mother (on one of her good days, of course). Contrastingly, the other one's hair is cut into a blunt, no-nonsense bob, and what she's wearing can only be described as an old-fashioned elevator girl uniform — with the tiny, impractical hat and everything.

They're both smiling, but the one with the bob looks more amused than kind.

Goro wishes he knew what was so goddamn funny.

He smothers that utterly futile train of thought quickly, redirecting what little energy he has into something more productive instead: cataloguing any details he can. Experience has taught him that any tiny scrap of information can be vital, both in reality, and when dealing with whatever fuckery the Metaverse decides to throw at him.

Inhaling deeply through his nose, he looks them over again.

All four beings have the same ethereal beauty about them, the same striking and vaguely western features (although he doubts they are from any country in his world), and the same platinum blonde hair.

Above all else, however, it's the eyes he keeps coming back to.

The four pairs of identical, unsettlingly bright, yellow eyes.

It's hard not to compare them to the ones belonging to the many shadows that Goro has corrupted or destroyed in the years spent pursuing his revenge. As far as he can tell, however, that's where the similarities end — he can see no trace of the animalistic anger or other base desires that he associates with shadows in them.

Unfortunately, and more importantly, he doesn't know what that actually means... something that's starting to feel like a trend.

Lastly — and while there's minor variation here and there — all four figures are also wearing the same shade of fucking blue.

Some of the annoyance must show on his face because the woman with the wavy hair speaks up. "Please, forgive my master," she starts, and her speaking voice is refined, soft, but nonetheless commanding. If Goro could, he'd sit up straighter in his chair. "He is still recovering, and we have a great deal to talk about. It might be best if my siblings and I do most of the conversing on his behalf."

"As long as someone explains what's going on," Goro responds, far more snippy than he intended. Which is just one more slightly worrying thing to add to the list. He's usually so good at hiding how he's feeling (he's usually the king of bullshit mountain), but his tongue is, seemingly, determined to be just as uncooperative as the rest of his body.

Fantastic.

"I am Margaret," she says, and if she's bothered by Goro's attitude, she doesn't show it. "These are my siblings…" She gestures to each one of them in turn, starting with the elevator girl and ending with the small child. "Elizabeth, Theodore, and I believe that you have already met my youngest sister, Lavenza."

The last name breaks through some of the haze in his head. Flashes and snippets of a Phantom Thief meeting in the nurse's office of Shujin Academy coming back to him.

It's still blurry, but he remembers having to borrow Ren's school tracksuit (and being bitterly disappointed, later, when Ren didn't forget to ask for it back) so that he could sneak into the building. How the air in the office had felt almost physically heavy with the weight of their uneasy truce.

And then, there was this girl, right in the middle of it.

She'd been in possession of a knowledge of the Metaverse, and their predicament, that had made Goro desperate for an opportunity to question her afterwards.

Which is somewhat ironic, in hindsight.

"Our master wishes to speak with you, for you have become untethered from your reality—"

"That is an interesting euphemism for dead, Margaret-san," Goro interrupts, apparently unable to help himself.

She regards him silently for a handful of uncomfortable seconds. Her expression stays neutral, but her eyes are hard (he's not so confident, all of a sudden, that they actually were gentle before), and Goro can't help but notice just how nervous her siblings have become at his interruption.

He decides, for the moment at least, not to push his luck any further.

It's not as if he has the means to defend himself in this bizarre situation, after all.

"There is no reason to be afraid," she says, in that soft voice, and Goro immediately fails, spectacularly, at his previous resolution when he can't stop his upper lip from curling away from his teeth in disgust. He does manage to bite the sharp retort that burns on the tip of his tongue, however, which is something at least.

"You are not dead," Margaret continues, matter-of-fact, as if she hadn't just upended the one and only thing that Goro was relatively sure of.

What?!

Mind racing again, he tries to reconcile this new information with the few solid facts bouncing around the inside of his muddled skull. Goro knows that they defeated Maruki — he'd felt reality shifting back to something more normal, more right, as the post-battle high and his consciousness slipped away.

But then he woke up in this surreal fucking nightmare, and now he's having to re-examine every conclusion he's made since Christmas Eve.

The big one: that he was as dead as a fucking doornail, had been confirmed by Maruki himself, hadn't it? That night in Leblanc, after Ren gave him the calling card — he'd essentially said that the only reason Goro was alive was because Ren had wished for it.

Something that Goro still refuses to give more than fleeting recognition. It's not a rabbit hole he could afford to go down that night in February, and it's certainly not something he wants to try to explore or understand now.

And, more to the point, he shouldn't fucking have to!

He was supposed to have winked out of existence once they stole that counsellor's shitty fucking treasure! Still blissfully ignorant as to why anyone might actually want him around.

Least of all, someone he'd tried to kill twice!

Margaret must decide to take pity on him (or, perhaps, she's just become fed up with waiting for a response while he sits here and almost has another breakdown), because she elaborates on her previous statement with no further prompting. "That is to say — you were never dead to begin with."

All the air seems to rush out of Goro's lungs at once, his vision goes blurry around the edges again, and it feels as if everything around him shifts sideways. There's suddenly a distant and persistent ringing sound in his ears, and he wonders, in a detached sort of way, if he's about to faint.

Would he even be allowed to slip to the floor, or is he cursed to remain stuck to this goddamn chair regardless?

Several deep and shuddering breaths later, his oxygen reserves are restored enough for him to regain his composure, somewhat, and when he forces himself to look back up, it's to five pairs of eyes watching him with an infuriating patience. He's still angry, but it's starting to take a back seat to how incredibly tired he is, exhausted to the point that everything about him feels heavy.

His tongue might as well be made of wet sand as he clears his throat and speaks. "That's not — it's impossible! I was shot — twice — and died, in my fa— in Shido's Palace," he rasps, absolutely hating how desperate and unsure he sounds. "I could have shrugged off the first one — maybe — even without healing items, but I can remember the second bullet hitting me right here—" And, miracle of fucking miracles, his body obeys, allowing him to tap the spot on his chest with a shaky fist. "I remember bleeding out.

"I sacrificed myself. So that the Phantom Thieves could escape—" Biting his tongue, he cuts himself off mid-sentence as he realises that — of all the emotions he could be experiencing right now — he feels robbed.

Closing that bulkhead door had felt like the only time he'd ever made the right choice, particularly now that everything he'd done to stop Maruki has, essentially, been undone. He remembers soothing himself with some stupid bullshit about redemption through death, all while his lifeblood had drained from him and pooled on the floor of the ship's engine room.

It's humiliating, and it makes him feel incredibly and embarrassingly pathetic.

"Compared to a normal human, it is difficult for a Persona-user to die in the Sea of Souls…" Elizabeth is speaking now, and Goro does his best to push his shame aside to focus on what she's saying. "But for one who also possesses the potential of the Wild Card? Except for in some very exceptional circumstances, it is impossible for them to truly die in a realm made entirely of another's cognition."

Any trace of the amusement that was on her face earlier is gone, and he thinks he might actually hear sympathy in her voice, or sadness.

He has a gut feeling that it's not directed at him.

Good.

"The Wild Card?" he asks, trying not to sound as bewildered, or annoyed, as he is.

It's Theodore that answers this time, eyeing Elizabeth a little warily as he does. "The inborn ability to form contracts with, and fuse, multiple Personas."

Ah.

Goro is well aware of the fact that his powers are different from those of the Phantom Thieves; Loki gave him the ability to contaminate the cognition of others with madness, and he can change his appearance in the Metaverse at will, becoming friend or foe as the situation demanded. All extremely useful implements in his assassin's toolbox.

And he can, of course, also summon more than one Persona — or at least he could. He's not entirely sure if he still has that ability after Hereward awakened in him...

The important thing, however, is that he also knows that he can't do what they're implying he should be able to.

An image of Ren, or rather Joker, effortlessly changing Personas on the fly to adapt to any situation flashes through his mind. There's a familiar bitter taste in his mouth. He has a feeling that he knows what's coming.

"I'm not able to do that," Goro bites out between gritted teeth.

"Ah, yes. Well, you were never given a true invitation to the Velvet Room, or assigned an attendant," Theodore continues, "and, therefore, never given the opportunity to realise your full potential."

Oh, look! There it is!

Yet another thing that Ren Amamiya had been handed on a silver fucking platter! All while Goro had been left to grope blindly in the dark (or go crawling to his asshole of a father), for any understanding of how the Metaverse or his powers worked.

It's not fair — the childish thought comes, unbidden, and not for the first time, chased immediately by shame and envy in equal parts.

Of course, it's not fair.

When has it ever been?

Goro would laugh if he didn't feel like he's going to choke on the bile rising up and into the back of his throat.

He forces himself to listen as Theodore goes on to recount how an entity called Yaldabaoth had taken Igor's form, with the specific purpose of making a bet with itself and pitting Goro and Ren against each other in some rigged cosmic game.

It's almost funny.

He used to justify so much of the awful shit he did by telling himself that his powers had been bestowed upon him by the gods, and now he knows that it was actually true! Just for entirely different, and far less flattering, reasons than he ever could have imagined.

At least, and for what feels like the first time in this conversation, there is one thing that Goro already knew. The name of this god — this Yaldabaoth. Ren had given him a truncated version of December's events, when they'd met in the laundromat across from Leblanc in the January that never happened, and that had included the revelation that Shido's political success had been all but guaranteed by an entity operating beneath their notice.

It becomes readily apparent, though — as Theodore continues his explanation — that Ren left out some of the more crucial details regarding the God of Control's intentions for Goro, personally.

Probably out of a misguided desire to spare his feelings.

Insufferable, sentimental fool.

Clenching his jaw so hard that he can feel his teeth strain in their sockets under the force of it (not trusting himself to remain silent as Theodore continues otherwise), Goro has to bite down even harder when it's mentioned, specifically, how close bonds are translated directly into strength for people with this Wild Card ability.

And then, of course, how the forming of these bonds was something that Yaldabaoth had encouraged for Ren and discouraged for him.

It only reinforces his feeling of being an oblivious rat in an incredibly cruel experiment.

"I was never visited by this god," Goro says, once Theodore finishes, more for confirmation than anything else. He might be a lot of things, but he's not stupid. The unpleasant déjà vu feeling he's been having this whole time has to be coming from somewhere.

"Yaldabaoth chose to converse with both of you in your sleep," Lavenza says, taking over, "but only my guest was permitted to remember in his waking mind. It was what was considered necessary for you to play your respective roles."

Letting his head fall back with a thud against the high back of the chair, Goro fixes his eyes on a random spot in the blue murk over Igor's shoulder. He feels that laugh (or maybe it's actually a sob) trying to come up again, at the same time that tears prick at the corners of his eyes.

Had he ever been in control of his life?

Did he really only exist to be used as a pawn by those with power?

After a moment, he asks, "What happened after the engine room?" Thankfully, his voice comes out far more serene than he feels. "I have no memories between what I assumed was my death, and when I was pulled into that counsellor's reality on Christmas Eve."

Lavenza clears her throat. "When a human with the ability of the Wild Card comes close to death while immersed in the Sea of Souls, their essence is returned to the Velvet Room. Where our master, or one of us in his absence, uses the power of their strongest relationships to heal their soul and restore their strength..." she trails off, as if she's uncomfortable with saying what comes next.

And why wouldn't she be? Goro thinks to himself with something approaching hysteria.

"So, I've just been loitering in what is, essentially, limbo, because I haven't made enough bonds…" He pauses to take a breath and a little of that mad laughter escapes on the exhale. "Let's speak plainly, shall we? It's because I don't have a single person who cares enough about me for it to have made a difference!"

Goro watches the little girl flinch, her gaze dropping away from his and to a spot on the floor in front of her feet. He should probably feel ashamed of the little burst of vindictive glee he gets for breaking her composure.

He doesn't.

"It is not quite as simple as that," Theodore admonishes, returning his hand to Lavenza's shoulder with a reassuring squeeze. It's such an unconsciously affectionate gesture that it makes the bitter thing in Goro's chest hurt. "For while it is true that you have far fewer connections than any guest we have hosted here before—"

Goro snorts derisively, but Theodore continues undeterred.

"—you have fostered one that is so strong that not only has it kept the very essence of your being safe here, it also protected you from further interference from Yaldabaoth. That pretender had hoped to use you as a trump card in the final battle, but the strength of your bond with my sister's guest shielded you from its influence. And so, we have been keeping watch over you here ever since, in the hope that you would come back to yourself."

Goro might understand what Theodore just said, technically, but there's no way he's going to actually try to think in depth about what exactly it all actually implies — specifically regarding the relationship that they're obviously referring to. He is nothing if not an expert at shoving aside his feelings when they aren't immediately useful.

"Barring the weeks when Maruki used his powers to forcefully return me to the real world."

"Precisely." Theodore sounds relieved that what he said seems to have gotten through to him without eliciting an unpleasant response. "Your soul returned to our care again once that man's dream was unravelled."

"What changed then?" Goro asks. "Why am I awake and aware now?"

Theodore raises one gloved hand to his chin in a delicate, contemplative way that mirrors some of Goro's own affected mannerisms so well that he wonders if it's intentional.

Which he knows is definitely paranoid, but he also knows that it doesn't necessarily mean that it's not true.

"Your short time spent in that distorted reality not only allowed you to forge some additional fledgling relationships," Theodore explains, and Goro briefly thinks of the Phantom Thieves (Haru Okumura and Futaba Sakura in particular), each one happy to fight alongside him against Maruki. It hadn't been forgiveness; he wasn't deluded enough to think he deserved that, but it had been acceptance and understanding. "But you also strengthened the very same bond that saved you from Yaldabaoth. Your connection to the other bearer of the Wild Card is so strong that you even managed to perform a Persona fusion outside of the Velvet Room. Is it so surprising, really, that it might also cause you to awaken once more?"

Goro thinks he might feel his eyebrows try to climb up into his hairline.

Persona fusion?

Is Theodore talking about Hereward…?

It's the only thing that seems to fit.

Goro had heard from the Phantom Thieves (and also seen firsthand) about how their own Personas evolved and changed over time, of course… but not one of them ever mentioned anything about 'fusion', had they?

Had something about his awakening been different from theirs?

"Your companions progressed one Persona through increasingly powerful forms by finding strength in their own convictions and self-acceptance," Margaret says, as if reading his mind. "You, however, took the essences of Loki and Robin Hood from within your heart, and without even realising it, used your bond with the other Wild Card as a conduit to fuse them to become Hereward."

Mulling, unhappily, on this new information for a few moments, Goro thinks about the strange but exhilarating rush he'd felt when he'd awakened to Hereward — so relieved, and secretly proud, that Ren had stood fast in the face of Maruki's attempts to manipulate him.

He collects his thoughts and schools his expression as best he can before speaking again. "If everything you've told me is true — and obviously, I don't really have any choice here, other than to take what you've said at face value — what happens now?"

Igor clears his throat, and Goro jumps in his seat. Making himself meet those unnerving eyes, he tries not to think about the way they look like they might just pop out of their sockets any second now.

"Your progress has been impressive, but slow, and we are reaching the limit of our powers. The Velvet Room is not equipped to maintain a human soul indefinitely, but — now that you are finally awake, and your consciousness has stabilised… Well, we may have the means to force the issue."

Before Goro can even begin to ask what exactly that entails, a clock chimes. Loud and jarring, the sound of it seems to come from everywhere and nowhere all at once, and the room physically shudders around them in time with each toll of the bell. Too exhausted by this point to be terrified, he watches with bewildered fascination as the shapes in the gloom become more and more defined, until they're surrounded by the strangely circular prison that he briefly glimpsed earlier.

"It is time, Master," Lavenza says, stepping forward and walking briskly until she's just in front of the desk and to Goro's right. She doesn't look at him, her gaze fixed firmly on some point behind the chair he's sitting in. The urge to turn and look is strong, but not one he can indulge himself in — not when his body is still refusing to cooperate.

Listening carefully for some indication of what's happening instead, he hears what sounds like old bedsprings creak from a few feet behind him, followed by a yawn.

A very familiar-sounding yawn.

Oh.

Oh, shit.

Goro feels his stomach drop and bounce back up into his throat like it's on a bungee line. His heart is suddenly pounding in his ears.

How many mornings had he heard that yawn? Standing together on the train platform, exchanging pleasantries and veiled barbs, all while playing at being normal teenagers.

"What's with the chair?" Ren Amamiya's voice breaks the heavy silence like a gunshot. He sounds tired and (infuriatingly) amused — not surprised in the slightest about being summoned to a metaphysical jail that exists somewhere between the cracks of reality.

Goro swallows thickly, still hidden by his ornate wing-back prison (how fitting!), as he spends the last few seconds before he's discovered being unable to decide if he's grateful to be alive, or if he wishes that he really was dead after all.

It's mortifying.

Chapter Text

Sighing deeply, Ren Amamiya stares up at the ceiling of his attic bedroom.

Tomorrow is his last full day in Tokyo before he has to go home, and no matter how hard he tries; he just can't seem to fall asleep.

It's not even only about leaving his friends behind (though, obviously, that's a big part of why he's feeling so awful). He just doesn't want to go back to Kanbara when all that's waiting for him there is a lukewarm reception from all the people that just kind of washed their hands of him before.

Ren knows that the only reason his parents seem even a little happy about him coming home now is because his record has been wiped squeaky-clean. Shido's charges against him have not only been dropped, but purged, and his most recent stint in detention is being kept secret, for 'security reasons'. Needless to say, he's more than a little fuzzy on the details. All Ren really knows for sure is that Sojiro and Makoto's sister had been whispering about it right after his release, and the only thing he'd been able to catch was the name 'Kirijo.'

What a trading company has to do with him, or his situation, is a complete mystery to Ren.

He has thought about asking Futaba to look into it a couple of times, of course, but honestly? He's also kind of reached the point where he doesn't really care.

Makoto's sister told him to let her take care of everything, and he tried. It's why he was willing to turn himself in to the police on Christmas Eve — even though just the sight of their uniforms still makes his chest go all tight and uncomfortable. And it had all been a massive waste of time, in the end. They hadn't been able to make any of the Metaverse-related charges stick to Shido, even with Ren's testimony.

But hey, at least the change of heart had made Shido more than willing to confess to his other (more traditional) crimes — so it's not like they have to worry about him going anywhere anytime soon.

Which, yeah, that's great and all, but it still doesn't change the fact that Ren spent two months in juvenile detention for no real reason.

Even so, he doesn't blame Sae Niijima for how things went down, not really. She tried her best — he gets that — but after everything that's happened, he guesses he's just feeling, kind of, uh… disillusioned? And that makes it hard to get worked up about what some faceless adults are doing behind the scenes.

Yeah, Ren is more focused on how his parents are going to lap up getting the chance to play the victims now — can already hear them pretending that they sent him away for his own safety, in fact, and how he's going to have to smile and nod along with them. There's no way they would ever admit that it was because they cared more about their gossipy neighbours than what actually happened.

…

Man, is it any wonder that he can't sleep?

Morgana, at least, hasn't had the same problem — curled up on his chest, snoring away softly — and Ren finds himself smiling, despite all the crap that's still swirling in his head.

Do normal cats snore, he wonders, or is it a weird cognitive side effect of knowing that Morgana can talk?

Looking fuzzy and unformed in the dark, his friend is a warm and reassuring weight, and Ren has to resist the urge to run his fingers through his soft fur. He doesn't think that Morgana would appreciate being woken up, and while misery may love company, Ren's not in any rush to get an arm full of needle-sharp claws and teeth for his trouble.

More time passes.

Ren's still wide awake.

He's counting the star stickers on the wooden beams above him for what feels like the hundredth time, when his thoughts drift (as they often do when he can't sleep) to the single leather glove that he knows is still in the pocket of his jacket, and then, to the black and white uniform tie that he has hidden under his mattress. Letting his left hand flop down at the side of the bed, he waits a few beats (until he's sure that Morgana isn't going to stir), before running his fingers under the seam of the mattress. It doesn't take long to find what he's looking for, tucked away safely, hidden inside a gap in one of the crates that makes up the base of his bed.

Pulling it free gently, he loops the tie around his fist and brings it up to his face in the dark, even though Ren already knows that any traces of the smell it once held (a mixture of Akechi's pretentious cologne and his laundry detergent) are long gone. Which makes sense, he's had it since November, after all, back when Akechi left it here by accident (Ren figures, because it would be super weird if it had been on purpose), during a Phantom Thieves meeting. It probably got lost in the shuffle when Ren was sorting through and allocating their equipment, just before they infiltrated the casino for the last time.

It only turned up again when he was cleaning his room to stave off boredom, back during that first week when he was legally dead and supposed to be in hiding. Ren can still remember how he'd shoved it, compulsively, under the nearest pile of junk on his desk, hiding it away like a demented squirrel storing nuts for the winter, before Morgana noticed and started asking awkward questions.

Once he found it a more permanent hiding place, he'd managed to be a little more sneaky with the tie — only taking it out the rare times when he's truly alone, or like now, when Morgana is in such a deep sleep that he doesn't have to worry about being caught.

It would be hard to explain to his friend why he feels so attached to the tie when he's barely able to admit it to himself.

Because, if he's being completely honest, he knows that if it was just that he thought Akechi was hot, it wouldn't be such a big deal. Ren has a lot of attractive friends, after all. Ignoring pretty faces, and even the occasional confession, are just things that he's had to get used to. Whether he's telling himself it's for the sake of the team, the mission, or just the simple fact that he's only in Tokyo for the short term, and the idea of getting into a relationship that starts with an expiration date makes him uncomfortable.

But truthfully, he knows that if Akechi had ever crossed the line — if he'd ever acted on that weird, crazy chemistry they shared — that all of his noble reasons for avoiding getting involved with someone while he was in Tokyo would have just mysteriously disappeared.

Maybe even if it had happened in November, when they knew Akechi was gearing up to betray them.

Maybe especially if it had happened in November.

His grip on the tie tightens a little at the thought. What is wrong with him?

It's probably not normal, right? Having semi-serious feelings for the person who essentially murdered you?

Especially when that person also happens to be dead.

There's a familiar feeling of dull regret sitting unpleasantly in his stomach. Ren had told himself that he was going to return the tie and glove (and collect on that promise for a rematch) to Akechi after they stole Maruki's treasure — so sure that when the dust had settled after the battle, Akechi would still be there with the rest of them. That through sheer force of will they'd be granted a real second chance.

Hadn't they been through enough to deserve one?

It worked that way with Morgana after the fight with Yaldabaoth, didn't it? The power of love and friendship was supposed to count for something when it came to all this cognitive stuff — like they had all been basically living in one of those cheesy shounen manga that Ryuji loves for the last year.

Nobody was actually supposed to stay dead.

This isn't like him — feeling this bitter — but Ren can't help it. It just hadn't seemed possible that he would actually lose Akechi again.

Closing his eyes and exhaling slowly through his nose, Ren pushes the thought as far away as it will go — pretending it's in the air leaving his lungs. It's only when he tries to open his eyes again that he realises that they're getting heavy in the weird, inorganic way he associates with being summoned to the Velvet Room.

Well, okay.

That's one way to finally get some sleep.

His eyelids are closing again without any real input from him, pulled shut, like they're being weighed down with lead. Everything blurs — reality bleeding at the edges until the mattress under his back is replaced by the hard prison cot.

Ren blinks up at the cracked ceiling of his cell a couple of times to get his bearings, before he sits up — yawning and rolling his neck until he gets that satisfying little pop.

Appearing in his normal clothes here, instead of that scratchy inmate uniform, is still something he's trying to get used to. Don't get him wrong, though; it's definitely an improvement. Between the cell door being open, and there not being a single shackle in sight, he could almost call it cosy.

In no rush to get moving, he turns just enough to look out the door, eyes skimming over Lavenza (who is looking especially serious tonight), and around the Velvet Room. The high-back chair in front of Igor's desk is a new addition, and he wonders briefly if he's going to be expected to sit in it, before he turns his attention to the three equally unfamiliar figures flanking Igor.

All yellow eyes and white-blonde hair. The family resemblance is striking.

They're probably waiting for him to ask who they are or why he's here, so Ren does what he does best and subverts expectation.

"What's with the chair?" he asks instead, as he stands up and makes his way to the front of the cell. Ren brings his hand to his chin in mock contemplation, putting on a show of looking the piece of furniture up and down.

Lavenza doesn't react. Not even an eye roll.

It makes him miss Caroline.

The twins were supposed to each have been one half of her, right? Why does it always feel like she's ninety percent Justine?

Ren stops in the doorway, both because crossing it still feels unnatural, and because he just noticed the weird current in the air, and how it's making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. Something about that chair is actually starting to make him nervous, which seems kind of dumb when he reminds himself that he's the kid who shot a literal god.

And then had a fistfight for the fate of humanity with his school counsellor, who kind of turned into a god.

He should probably hope that next winter will be a little less... busy. He doesn't though, not really.

"Welcome back, Trickster," Lavenza says, finally speaking up. Stepping to one side, she gestures towards the spot on the floor she just moved from. Not to the chair, though, he notices. Huh, maybe it's not there for him to sit in, after all. He's weirdly relieved. "If you could please approach the desk, my master needs to speak with you."

Shrugging, Ren takes a handful of steps forward; he's thinking about what possible reason he could have been summoned here for, when he casually looks to his left and his brain stutters, tumbles over itself and then screeches to a halt.

He's pretty sure he does an actual double take.

Holy shit!

Goro goddamn Akechi is sitting in the chair! And he's looking up at Ren with these big wide eyes, like he's the one who just saw a ghost!

"You're alive?" Ren says, lamely. His voice sounds very far away, like it's just an echo of when he'd asked the same question on that 'ideal' Christmas Eve. Back when Akechi had seemingly cheated death for the first time.

The déjà vu is overwhelming. His knees feel weak. Man, he really hopes that he isn't about to faint in front of his rival/friend/enemy/crush, who is definitely supposed to be dead.

"Apparently," Akechi replies, having recovered enough to use that arrogant, prissy tone that Ren simultaneously hates and loves.

He is vaguely aware of the fact that Igor is talking, and that it's probably important.

Ren doesn't care.

Akechi is actually here! Right in front of him! And looking completely out of place in the Velvet Room in his winter uniform. Something about what he's wearing is off, though — something is missing, in fact, and it takes Ren a second to realise that it's because Akechi isn't wearing his tie or right glove. Cognition is a funny thing, and while he's sure Akechi probably has a million spares in the real world, Ren has a gut feeling that he knows exactly where the missing ones are.

There's this… feeling, bubbling up in his chest, and Ren thinks he might burst if he doesn't do something. Hands twitching at his sides, he's seized by the sudden impulse to reach out and touch Akechi — needing to confirm that he won't just disappear in a dramatic puff of smoke the second he looks away.

And, well, it's about as awkward as can be expected — taking Akechi's bare hand in his own, in some weird, cringy hybrid of a handshake and outright hand holding. Akechi, for his part, looks horrified for half a second before he obviously catches himself, and forces his expression into something closer to disgruntled than aghast.

Ren squeezes his hand (because he doesn't really know what else to do) and Akechi sneers half-heartedly and rolls his eyes.

A tense second passes between them (one where Akechi continues to look a little like he just bit into a lemon), but then he squeezes back! Hard, like it's a challenge, before he pulls his hand back. Ren watches him flex and clench his fingers against the arm of the chair, as if having to touch someone else has left him with pins and needles.

Ren's heart soars.

His face feels like it's going to split in two from how hard he's smiling.

Lavenza makes a polite little coughing sound, and Ren manages to turn some of his attention back to the other individuals in the room.

"How is this possible?"

"If you could, Trickster, please try to focus on what my master is attempting to tell you." There's annoyance lurking under her usual politeness, and the hand that's not holding her grimoire flexes at her side, like she's looking for a baton she doesn't have. Ren smiles even harder. He knew Caroline was still in there somewhere.

"Sorry," he says, without really meaning it, but he does actually try to pay attention this time.

The introductions come first (he'd been right on the money about them all being related anyway), and then he gets the full explanation of how and why Akechi ended up in the Velvet Room. It's hard not to end up with a serious case of the warm and fuzzies when they confirm that Akechi really is a Wild Card, just like him. Even after everything that's happened over the last year, Ren still doesn't really believe in fate — or at least, he doesn't believe that it's some immovable thing that's set in stone — but there's something about his connection to Akechi that feels like it was inevitable.

Like they'd always be drawn together, even without Yaldabaoth's meddling.

Ren hasn't really spoken with this Igor — the real Igor — all that much, but he can see that all this talking is taking a lot out of him. The old man is clearly flagging, and the four attendants hurry to take over, especially Lavenza — who goes out of her way (more than once) to mention, specifically, that he's her guest.

It's impressive, and more than a little uncanny, just how seamlessly the four of them can continue and finish each other's sentences, all without missing a beat. It reminds Ren of the way it used to be when Lavenza was two little girls instead of one.

Another thing that's kind of freaky is learning that he had never really been able to be killed in the Metaverse. It turns out that he could have 'died' there more than once, only to be healed in the Velvet Room and returned to battle, no worse for wear.

They're being deliberately vague about it, Ren thinks.

If it has happened, he doesn't remember it.

(He can't really decide if that's a good or a bad thing.)

Ren thinks of Ryuji, hanging off that lever for the lifeboat in Shido's Palace, just before the explosion that nearly killed him. He already regrets not going in his friend's place — even though he knows he can't run anywhere near as fast — but to find out that he could have done it safely, while Ryuji risked his life…

It makes him feel like there's a rock in the pit of his stomach.

"So, to answer your earlier question," Elizabeth says, snapping Ren back out of it. "This is possible because of the sheer strength of the connection shared between you — the pull of two hearts reaching out to one another across the ocean of dreams."

Ren blinks a couple of times.

She has to know what that sounds like, right?

Being no stranger to the fancy, flowery language used by Lavenza (and Justine before her), Ren's not sure how much he should read into what Elizabeth just said.

It's a little like trying to ignore the innuendo in the otherwise innocent statements that Yusuke makes.

He looks back down at Akechi, trying to gauge his reaction — he's avoiding eye contact, and there's a pretty, red flush spread across his cheekbones and down his neck, but his expression is sour. Ren can't tell if he's embarrassed or furious. It's probably both. He doesn't think that Akechi can physically have an emotion without cutting it with at least a little rage.

Ren wants to be mean and ask what's got him so flustered.

He turns his attention back to Igor instead. "What do you need me to do?"

"The same thing that you did when your other companions were trapped here, Trickster," Lavenza starts, though it's Margaret that finishes the answer. "You are the key; all you need to do is take him with you through the door."

Ren thinks that might be oversimplifying things, a little — he'd had to do a bit more than that when he rescued his friends from the Velvet Room before — but, hey, he isn't going to complain if that's really all it's going to take now.

And it's probably for the best anyway; he doesn't think that Akechi is going to be up for an impromptu pep talk about reclaiming his rebel nature any time soon.

"Ready?" he asks, turning back to Akechi.

"As much as I would love to get the hell out of here, Ren…" Akechi's earlier embarrassment is now smothered in a honeyed tone that has a nice current of sarcasm running underneath it. "I think your friends here did something to me. I can't move."

Ren looks back to Lavenza and Igor questioningly.

"A precautionary measure, considering your companion's volatile nature," Igor says, by way of explanation — not breaking eye contact with Ren as he lifts a hand and snaps his fingers in a way that sounds far too loud to have come from someone wearing gloves. "I am sure that you understand."

Oh, Ren definitely understands.

The effect is pretty much immediate. Akechi suddenly and visibly relaxes in the chair, slumping bodily, as if his spine had literally been glued to the back of it before.

Hey, for all Ren knows, maybe it had been.

"Ah, that's much better," Akechi says, with a pretty little sigh. Then he stands up and stretches his arms above his head, and Ren pretends not to see the flash of skin when his blazer and shirt hike up a little in the process.

As his eyes try to find something less distracting to focus on, Ren notices how, now that Akechi is standing, every attendant in the room is clutching the heavy tome each has under their arm a little tighter. From experience, Ren knows those books (or the one that Lavenza's holding, at least) contain a lot of powerful Personas.

It makes him realise just how badly weakened Igor must be, after being locked away by Yaldabaoth.

Akechi must notice their nervous, protective behaviour too, because when he speaks again there's no trace of his previous sarcasm. In fact, he seems to have turned the dial all the way to Detective Prince so hard that he's broken it in the process. Ren isn't sure if it's a genuine attempt to smooth things over, or if it's just some pathological need to control the exchange, but he does know that he doesn't like it — that he wants to push, until Akechi can't hide behind that fake smile anymore.

"I must apologise for my rudeness earlier, Igor-san," he says. "I am truly grateful to you for your hospitality, and for your enlightening explanation of my situation." Akechi even bows deferentially, the perfect picture of disarming charm (Ren can almost see the sparkles). It might even be believable if Ren didn't also have first-hand experience with just how much of a catty little turd Akechi actually is. "But if you don't mind, I think that my friend and I will take our leave. Farewell."

Apparently done, Akechi turns on his heel, in that over the top way of his (the kind of spin that would make the fringe on the epaulettes of his prince outfit swish dramatically), and their eyes meet. Akechi's TV smile is still firmly in place, but his eyes, which Ren knows are a warm brown, catch the light in a way that makes them look red. There's a sharp spark of almost offended fascination there, like Ren is a particularly interesting but potentially dangerous insect, and Akechi is weighing his options regarding extermination.

It does funny things to Ren's insides, and he thinks to himself (not for the first time) that Akechi might not be the only one, between the two of them, who's a little messed up.

Ren clears his throat, and then does his best to cover whatever it is he's feeling with bravado, bowing a little at the waist and making a grand sweeping gesture with his arm towards the cell he came from. "After you."

Clearly, his showmanship is wasted on Akechi, since he just walks right past without any real acknowledgement, other than an annoyed cluck of his tongue.

So Ren just shrugs, says his thanks and his goodbyes (and promises Lavenza that he'll come back tomorrow for a proper farewell), and then follows Akechi.

The cell feels very small with both of them in it.

"I don't see a door?" Akechi says, his statement turning up and into a question at the end.

Ren looks from the big rectangle of light in the rear wall of the cell that Akechi apparently can't see, to Akechi himself (who's watching him expectantly), and back again.

Huh.

Running through a few scenarios in his head, Ren realises that the two most attractive ones are also by far the most dangerous. He can't imagine Akechi would appreciate being carried, bridal style, across the threshold, nor does he think it would go down particularly well if he were to shove him through the door with a well-placed kick — channelling his inner Caroline.

Opting for a third, marginally safer, option, Ren rests his palm against the small of Akechi's back, and isn't quite able to keep the smile off his face when even just the gentle touch makes Akechi jolt in place.

"You just need to trust me," Ren says, and isn't really surprised when it earns him a truly withering glare. But, even with his obvious misgivings, Akechi doesn't resist when Ren guides him towards the light (even though, from his perspective, it must look like they're about to walk face-first into a wall), and obediently keeps step with him as they pass through the door together.

It's only as Ren feels the familiar, but still disorienting, sensation that comes with returning to a horizontal body, that he remembers that he'd entered the Velvet Room while he was asleep.

In his bed.

They're not going to be casually stepping out into the alley in Shibuya, is what he's saying.

It's the last thought that goes through his head before he jerks awake, sitting up and groping blindly for his phone in the dark. Morgana yowls in surprise as he's dislodged from his usual sleeping spot, and Ren feels bad, but the torch on his phone is the only light source he has to hand and this is an emergency!

He barely registers the time (3:17 a.m.), while he fumbles with his lock-screen pattern.

"Ren, wha—?!" Morgana starts, before he cuts himself off, his night vision clearly doing the job that Ren's uncooperative phone will not — and Ren nearly drops the dumb thing entirely when Morgana screeches, "Akechi?!"

"Hello, Morgana," Akechi says, from somewhere on the floor beside the bed, and Ren releases the breath that he hadn't realised he was holding.

Akechi sounds surprisingly unruffled considering the circumstances.

Managing, finally, to turn his torch on, Ren sets the phone aside, face-down, so that the light shines upwards. It's not much, but it's bright enough to see by, at least. Morgana is sitting halfway down the bed, peering over the edge, with his puffed-up tail swishing discontentedly from side to side.

And yep, Akechi really is down there, lying on the floor, with one arm slung across his eyes.

Just like in the Velvet Room, he's wearing his winter uniform, only it's more complete now — with his tie, and both gloves, accounted for. Ren has to assume that it's what he'd been wearing before confronting them in Shido's Palace, back in December, before he 'died' and was taken in by Igor and his attendants.

The arm covering half of Akechi's face isn't actually doing a whole lot to hide how he's feeling, Ren thinks, as he takes in the grim set of his jaw and the way he's worrying his lower lip between his teeth, hard enough that Ren's kind of surprised that it's not bleeding.

"Can someone explain what's going on?!" Morgana asks, not as loudly as before. Thankfully. "I thought he was dead!"

"Me too," Ren says, at the same time that Akechi deadpans, "So did I."

A surprised bark of laughter escapes Ren's mouth before he can cover it. He has a feeling that he's close to cracking up, and spiralling into hysterics doesn't seem like the best idea right now.

The lack of sleep definitely isn't helping.

Morgana, though, doesn't seem to think it's all that funny — looking all kinds of grumpy and unimpressed — so Ren takes a breath and starts trying to explain.

"Akechi's actually been, uh, stuck in the Velvet Room all this time, and—"

"Is that my tie?" Akechi interrupts conversationally, pushing himself up into a sitting position as he gestures with one hand in the general direction of the black and white crumpled length of material on Ren's mattress.

The tie — the one that Ren fell asleep holding — looks especially sad compared to the nice, neat one currently looped around Akechi's neck.

Oh.

Oh, no.

Ren prides himself on his poker face, even without his glasses to hide behind. So yeah, he might be freaking out on the inside, but he's pretty sure that he still pulls off sounding convincingly nonchalant when he answers. "Nah, that's mine."

Akechi's eyes narrow a fraction and the pleasant mask slips a little, his smile taking on that hard edge that Ren had only really seen when they'd been working together against Maruki.

His heart does a little dance in his chest.

"That's clearly Akechi's tie..." Morgana mutters under his breath, using the same tone that he usually reserves for when Ryuji says something he finds especially stupid.

Ren ignores him.

Because he knows what Akechi is doing here — or trying to do, anyway. Bringing up the tie is a decoy, a distraction, a last-ditch attempt to take control of their conversation so that he can delay (and maybe escape) the actual discussion.

It's a risky tactic. One with the potential to embarrass Akechi just as much as him.

Which goes to show just how much Akechi does not want to talk about what happened, or more probably, why any of it was able to happen in the first place.

Akechi is just staring up at him, one hand on his chin, and that sharp, calculating expression still firmly in place — like he's waiting for Ren to make a move.

Or break.

It's not helped by the fact that Morgana is watching him expectantly too.

Feeling a little like a butterfly pinned to a board, Ren decides to get up out of bed — not seeing any other way to dispel the tension hanging over them. Although he does immediately find himself second-guessing his decision when he has to step over an uncooperative Akechi on the way to his desk.

He clicks the lamp on when he gets there — just to do something, really — and while the dim light isn't a big improvement over his phone torch, getting the bit of distance helps Ren find his voice again.

"We should go downstairs and talk about this," he says, and then hastily tacks an 'alone' onto the end of the sentence when Morgana moves to jump down off the bed. Ren could nearly clap himself on the back for how steady his voice sounds, honestly. Maybe all that negotiating with hostile shadows he's done over the last year is starting to pay off.

"Is that a good idea?" Morgana stage whispers, looking askance at Akechi.

"Even if I were inclined to do something, how exactly would you be able to help?" Akechi asks, with a smug little chuckle that's absolutely dripping with condescension.

God, Ren missed him so much.

Morgana literally bristles, tail puffing back up into an angry bush, as he splutters furiously — speechless.

"I'll be fine, Morgana," Ren soothes, using his best mediator voice — the one he usually breaks out when it's Morgana and Ryuji that are at each other's throats. "I promise."

Morgana grumbles something under his breath (all Ren catches is Akechi's name), but he settles back down onto the bed, tucking his legs under his body and his tail around himself. For good measure, Ren throws a smile his friend's way — one that he hopes is reassuring.

Akechi, meanwhile, has found his feet and is currently brushing his clothes off with this ridiculously fussy frown on his face.

Ren snorts a laugh and heads for the stairs, not waiting to see if Akechi follows.

Chapter Text

Goro is, honestly, still trying to play catch-up after coming to on the hard floor of Leblanc's attic.

Going from standing to supine, mid-step and with absolutely no warning is not an experience he's in a hurry to repeat anytime soon, but he thinks it might still be preferable to what's going to come next.

Morgana's shrill voice is grating, cutting through the quiet darkness from somewhere to his right, and it's only through years of practised dishonesty that Goro manages a blandly polite greeting — even while he's thinking about how much easier (and far more satisfying) it would be to just wring that furry little neck.

He desperately wants to avoid any serious conversation right now, particularly one about bonds and connections and hearts. It's ridiculous, and it's all been far too fucking much at once. Is it any wonder, really, that he's still struggling with the sheer load of everything he learned in the Velvet Room?

Not to mention the simple fact that he's actually alive.

Goro had fully come to terms with being dead in the time they'd spent dealing with Maruki.

The entire experience has left him shaken and off-kilter in a way that he hasn't felt since he'd found himself staring down the Phantom Thieves in the engine room of his piece of shit father's Palace. When they had, inexplicably, reacted to his attempt to murder them with an olive branch and an offer of a place on their team.

Always too naïvely virtuous for their own fucking good.

"Can someone explain what's going on?!" Morgana whines, and Goro thinks that if you could distil the very essence of the sound of nails being dragged over a chalkboard, it would probably be indistinguishable from that pest's voice. "I thought he was dead!"

"So did I," he replies flatly, at the same time that Ren says something quietly that Goro doesn't quite catch.

Then Ren laughs, uncharacteristically loud, for a second before stopping himself, and Goro is hit immediately by two opposing but equally strong desires: he wants to make Ren laugh like that again, but simultaneously, he also wants to throttle him.

Because none of this is fucking funny.

It's bad enough that he's going to be expected to talk to Ren about everything that's happened, but the situation is made one hundred times worse when Goro realises that Ren is going to attempt to explain things to Morgana — who is easily his least favourite Phantom Thief at the best of times, and is doing nothing to remedy that by having the nerve to think it's owed an explanation in the first place.

So it's not surprising, really, that he would jump at the first opportunity to divert the conversation the second it presents itself.

"Is that my tie?" Goro hears himself ask, and it comes out light and airy, despite the crushing regret that immediately chases the words when his brain catches up to his mouth.

Shit.

And not only does Goro's question not fluster Ren in the slightest (his annoyingly handsome face staying frustratingly blank when he brushes the inquiry off, with a nonsensical assertion that the tie actually belongs to him!), it just serves to feed that sickly hope growing like a tumour in his chest.

It doesn't take any great amount of deductive reasoning to figure out why Ren is apparently sleeping with items of his clothing, after all. It's just the kind of maudlin, simpering bullshit that should make him want to puke.

But that would be hypocritical, wouldn't it?

How many times had he sat alone in his apartment, letting his mind drift into pathetically juvenile fantasies about Ren?

Before things had spiralled out of control in November, of course, when Shido (or maybe it had actually been Yaldabaoth, pulling the strings from behind the scenes) had decided that scapegoating the Phantom Thieves wasn't a permanent enough solution. And Goro, blinded by how close he was to achieving his revenge, had been all too happy to smother his other fledgling hopes and dreams in their crib.

It's becoming readily apparent, however, that he'd only ever been as successful in killing off those pipe dreams as he had been in killing the one who inspired them. They're all coming back to him now. Creeping through his veins like weeds and making his stomach feel like it's in as much of a knotted pile as the well-loved tie on Ren's bed.

It makes him grateful for how dim the light is. He might be able to control his expression relatively well, but his face feels uncomfortably (and tellingly) hot.

Goro is already struggling with the idea that Ren could actually want to be his... friend after everything that has happened between them. Granted, he doesn't have much experience in the area, but he's still relatively sure that murdering the other person is the kind of thing that tends to put a damper on most friendships.

Accepting that there might be the potential for something more than that seems foolhardy, and absolutely dangerous.

The idea that he might be worthy of it seems even more foolish, and his brain is scrambling to focus on literally anything else.

He's pulled from his thoughts when Ren moves to get up, and realises that he's been staring, like a moron — he can only hope that he looks more composed than he feels. It speaks to how desperate Goro is, really, that even though he's not necessarily trying to be an obstruction when Ren has to step over him awkwardly to get out of bed, he does feel a smidge of mean-spirited disappointment when Ren doesn't trip or stumble in the process.

Because he has to wonder how much time it might have bought him if Ren had fallen.

Potentially enough for him to sprint down the stairs and out into the night?

Right into the path of an obliging vehicle, hopefully.

(He's sure that Futaba Sakura would appreciate the irony.)

"We should go downstairs and talk about this," Ren says, in that infuriatingly calm voice of his. "Alone."

Feeling well and truly trapped, the nearest outlet for Goro's frustration is the supremely simple task of provoking Morgana. The stupid cat rises predictably to the bait, but even the small crumbs of satisfaction that come with its indignant reaction don't really do much to settle Goro's nerves.

He has to admit to himself that he's just delaying the inevitable at this point.

There's a minor tremor in his legs as he stands up, but it's small enough that he's sure it isn't noticeable in the gloom. Without really thinking about it, Goro starts to dust himself off — he can't see any actual dirt or cobwebs around or on his clothes, but maintaining his appearance is something that he easily falls back on as a small way to exercise control when he feels unmoored.

And Ren has the fucking audacity to laugh at him for it!

Goro has to work incredibly hard not to react outwardly — willing Ren's dark mop of hair to catch on fire instead, as he disappears out of sight and down the stairwell.

Then, to add insult to injury, he notices that Morgana is still glaring up at him. Managing, somehow, to fit a human expression of suspicion onto an otherwise normal cat face.

He hopes it chokes on a fucking furball.

"Well, Morgana," Goro says, straightening his tie as he walks towards the stairs as well — he's all out of stalling tactics. "It's been a pleasure, as always."

There's no answer (bar some muttering that sounds suspiciously like the cat just repeating what he said in a poor imitation of his voice), and he can still feel those blue eyes boring into him as he descends. The desire to glare back is a childish one that he doesn't give in to — although, if he's being honest, it's a close thing.

His shoes sound far too loud on the wooden stairs, each step ringing out in the quiet like a nail hammered into a coffin, only increasing the dreadful anticipation mounting exponentially inside of him as he enters the café proper.

But the sight that greets him is deceptively welcoming in its familiarity. Ren is behind the counter, peering into the old fridge in the back, and Goro moves on autopilot to the stool that he still thinks of as his. Even catching himself tracing a whorl in the wood of the bar with absent-minded affection as he sits down.

The air is full of the rich smell of coffee, spices, and the faint (but not unpleasant) undercurrent of cigarette smoke.

For a moment, it almost feels like he's stepped back in time.

"Do you want something to drink?" Ren asks, like everything really is normal, and not entirely fucking surreal. "And before you ask, I'm not making coffee — it's three in the morning."

That surprises a small, genuine laugh out of him, and some of the tension goes out of the air with it.

"Water is fine, thank you."

Still, it's with an uneasy wariness that he watches Ren round the counter, two bottles of water in hand, as he moves behind Goro to take a seat in the middle booth. He has to twist in his own seat just to keep Ren in his line of sight, and he's beginning to wonder if it's intentional when his bottle is thrown to him just as he turns.

Saved only by his quick reflexes, he catches it deftly — along with the glimmer of amusement in Ren's eyes that tells him that it was definitely intentional.

Oh, it's like that, is it?

It will take a lot more than a little horseplay to get a rise out of him, however, and he puts on his best bullshit smile before responding, enjoying the almost imperceptible flash of annoyance he gets in return.

"It's been a while since I've been here as a customer, Ren, but I sincerely hope you don't make a habit of tossing beverages at people—" Immediately, Goro's thoughts snag and loop back around to the first part of what he just said.

How long exactly has it been since he's been a customer here?

How long since he's been anything here?

Or anywhere?

Hands shaking slightly, he pulls back his sleeve and taps the screen of the smartwatch on his wrist. It's dead.

Then he reaches into his pocket and takes out his phone — also dead.

Great.

"What's the date?" Goro's mind is racing — quickly cataloguing a handful of things that really should have jumped out at him immediately, while he was still upstairs. Details that he would have caught if he hadn't been so distracted by being a flustered fucking idiot!

There had been no sign of anything to keep the poorly insulated attic warm. No space heater or anything similar. And the window had even been open slightly.

It's not December, or January, clearly…

Which leaves him with the obvious question: How much time has passed while he's been stuck in the Velvet Room?

"Yeah, that was one of the things I wanted to talk to you about," Ren replies, with a sheepish expression that's halfway between a wince and a smile. Not a good sign, Goro thinks, as he watches Ren rub self-consciously at the back of his neck. "It's the eighteenth — wait, I guess it's actually the morning now... so, uh, it's the nineteenth of March."

Just over three months.

Fuck.

"I've completely missed the investigation into Shido, then?" Goro laughs. It comes out a broken thing with jagged edges. "And with it, my last opportunity to have any meaningful involvement in bringing him down."

"You saved us in his Palace, Akechi," Ren says, and he sounds so disgustingly earnest it makes Goro feel queasy. "We wouldn't have been able to change his heart without you."

"Can you even hear yourself?" Goro sneers in angry disbelief, slamming his bottle down on the bar. Ren doesn't even have the courtesy to flinch, which just pisses him off even more. "It was my fault that you had to be saved in the first place, you absolute imbecile! That cognitive version of me was a trap set by Shido — a last line of defence in case I ever tried to go after his shadow. Which means that it wouldn't have been there at all if I hadn't come in to find you, and even if it had, you would have been able to defeat it easily if you hadn't had to fight me first!"

"It doesn't matter." Ren's gaze is clear, steady — without a shred of self-doubt. Goro has always had trouble facing him when he's like this. It's infuriating. "You thought you were going to die, and you still fought to save us."

Goro rakes his hands backwards through his hair, and only just stops himself from pulling it out of sheer frustration. "What is wrong with you?! Why don't you hate me?!"

"Because you're my friend, and I care about you," Ren answers, like it's that simple.

"I shot you!"

"It didn't stick." Ren shrugs it off, as if Goro had just stepped on his damned toe, or something, rather than tried to murder him in cold blood.

It's the straw that breaks the camel's back.

Goro sees red.

He's up and off the stool without thinking, crossing the space between them in two steps and looming over Ren — who is still sitting with one arm draped casually over the back of the booth seat. Apparently unfazed, he doesn't look especially worried, and only winces slightly when Goro reaches out to grab a fistful of his hair, pulling his bangs back and away from his face in a rough, jerky motion.

"I put a bullet through your thick fucking skull! Right. Here." He jabs his index finger, hard, into the centre of Ren's forehead on the last two words for emphasis. "And I enjoyed it!"

Somehow, Ren remains cool as a goddamned cucumber, despite the fact that Goro is nearly pulling his hair out by the roots. "You keep telling yourself that. Maybe you'll actually believe it."

It's baffling, it's fucking incomprehensible, how he can remain so calm, given the circumstances (both past and present), and Goro finds himself desperately searching for something on Ren's face — anything that might show that he's not as sure of himself as he seems.

A pointless exercise, of course. All he sees in those dark eyes is trust, and some nameless, warm thing that makes Goro feel like he's being pulled in twenty different directions at once.

It makes him want to claw his own skin off.

It's the fucking engine room all over again! He doesn't deserve anything Ren is offering, but he still wants it — desperately, hopelessly, pathetically. He doubts there will be an opportunity for him to make a noble sacrifice just to avoid talking about it this time.

A gentle hand comes to rest on his wrist, and Goro does not jump at the touch, because he is the one in control here. Making absolutely no effort to extract the fist from his hair, Ren just squeezes his wrist softly, reassuringly, and Goro feels some of the fight drain from him. Not all of it, no — not by a long shot — but enough. Enough that it suddenly becomes extremely obvious what an intimate position he's put the two of them in.

Rooted to the spot, he stares down into Ren's eyes and is suddenly struck by the realisation that he's never actually seen him up close like this. Not without something in the way (whether it was his mask, glasses or those long messy bangs) at least. And while he has always found Ren attractive (because he's not fucking blind), it's only now that it really slaps him in the face.

It's with mounting horror that he finally admits to himself that the snarled up emotion squirming in his chest cannot only be blamed on misdirected aggression, jealousy, or even just his treacherous libido. He is truly and hopelessly infatuated with this boy, and his heart currently feels like a frantic bird trapped in his ribcage, trying desperately to beat its way out.

Fuck.

And he knows that he's given himself away entirely when a smirk that is entirely Joker creeps across Ren's face.

"Like what you see?"

Fuck!

Goro hears himself splutter something unintelligible, like a complete and utter fool, and he lets go of the fistful of hair he's holding as quickly as he would if he'd been burned by it. The only thought in his head suddenly — the only thing he can think to do to salvage this situation, whatever the fuck it even is — is to put as much distance between them as quickly as possible.

He tries to step away, but Ren has other ideas (Ren always has other fucking ideas!) and just comes with him, still attached to his wrist.

That gentle grip from earlier is starting to feel more like a vice.

"Stop running away," Ren tuts, with a fond exasperation that just raises Goro's hackles.

"Oh, fuck you — I am not running away," he lies through gritted teeth, absolutely loathing how ridiculous and petulant he sounds as he takes another step backwards.

"Yeah? Prove it."

Ren is entirely in his space now, with that shitty smug expression still on his face as he crowds Goro back against the bar. Two stools bracket them on either side, and he realises, with an almost sickening excitement, that he's trapped.

They're essentially nose to nose now, and when their eyes meet again, it's like a literal electric current runs through him, zipping up and down his spine until it settles to pleasantly roll somewhere low in his gut. Fuck, he's never gotten so hard so fast in his life and nothing has even happened yet! Ears burning hot with shame, he's not quite sure if he should just be relieved that at least some part of him knows what it wants.

Goro does his best not to think about how he's gone eighteen years, and to his grave twice over, without ever having his first kiss.

Fuck it, it's fine. He's always been a quick study, hasn't he?

His eyes flick down to Ren's mouth of their own accord, lingering over the soft curve of pink lips before he realises that he's staring again, and quickly hurries to drag his gaze back up to meet Ren's. He finds a smouldering heat in those grey eyes, but there's also a question, and Goro realises that he's waiting for permission.

Because of course he is. God, he wants to shake him.

"Just fucking do it!" he snarls, and Ren, being the insufferable bastard that he is, huffs a breathy little laugh that's just as alluring as it is aggravating, before leaning in and pressing their lips together.

The kiss starts out soft and gentle, with Ren bringing both of his hands up to cup the sides of Goro's face. Even the initial, tentative slide of Ren's tongue against his own is somehow poignant. It's too much. There's something painful burning in his chest and making his eyes sting, and Goro just can't — he can't accept something so tender and affectionate.

So, he doesn't. Grabbing two fistfuls of Ren's sweatshirt, he pulls him closer, until their bodies are flush against each other and Goro can feel the hard press of Ren's cock against his own. Growling into the kiss as he takes the lead, he picks up the pace and turns it into a sharp, sloppy thing full of teeth that makes him feel like he's going to vibrate out of his skin.

Not sure exactly when it got there, Goro realises that his right hand is tangled in Ren's hair again. He pulls it — hard — breaking the kiss and jerking Ren's head to the side to expose the long line of his neck. Noting with great interest how Ren gasps and his eyelids flutter in obvious pleasure, simply at being treated so roughly.

What a freak, he thinks, with something far closer to affection than derision.

The way Ren seems content to submit to him in this is surprising, yes, but also incredibly thrilling. It makes the blood sing in his veins, and he has his teeth in soft skin before he even thinks about it. Sucking and biting his way down Ren's neck to the junction where it meets his shoulder, Goro savours the way he groans, and then how his hips twitch forward reflexively when he really sinks his teeth in.

Ren's hands are on his ass — have been on his ass — and he pulls Goro even closer now, grinding their hips together desperately. Until they're essentially rutting against each other like animals, and Goro has to put all that's left of his higher brain functions into reminding himself not to bite hard enough to break the skin, or even worse, come in his pants like the blushing virgin he's trying very hard not to expose himself as.

He pulls back a little — to catch his breath mostly, but also so that he can admire his handiwork. And he's not disappointed. Like a breadcrumb trail, he follows the string of small bruises that lead to the truly impressive love bite that's standing out in vivid red-purple against pale skin, just above the loose neck of Ren's sweatshirt.

Even just the sight of it stokes something dark and possessive inside of him. A spike of avaricious desire that is both alien and familiar — a whisper of 'mine' that prickles like Loki's claws over his skin.

Still riding high on that feeling, Goro brings his free hand to his mouth and catches the leather covering his index finger between his teeth. He pulls the glove off in one smooth motion and allows it to fall to the floor. Ren watches him from under heavy eyelids, his breath coming out in little huffs that increase in speed when Goro brings his now bare hand down to the waistband of those awful sweatpants. Running his fingers along the band teasingly before slipping his hand inside — he falters and hesitates when he realises that Ren isn't wearing anything underneath.

So surprised he almost laughs, Goro quirks a questioning eyebrow at Ren. The only answer he gets is a shrug — something that would normally piss Goro off, honestly, but when Ren's usual unaffected act has been spoiled so wonderfully by blown pupils and heavy, shaky breathing, it's hard to hold it against him. And things only get better when he actually jumps as Goro wraps his fingers around his cock.

Emboldened by the reaction, he tightens his grip and squeezes — just the way he likes it himself — and feels the sharp smile on his face widen when Ren gasps and shivers bodily.

Still, it's strange doing this to someone else. The angle feels wrong and more than a little awkward, even as his own cock twitches in appreciation of the hot, heavy weight against his palm.

A few experimental pumps are all it takes before he finds a comfortable rhythm, and the effect is instantaneous. Almost turning into a puddle against him, Ren's hands fly up to Goro's shoulders for support as his breath stutters and catches in his throat around a series of soft little 'ah' sounds. He looks absolutely wrecked already, eyes hazy and unfocused, with a feverish-looking flush spreading across his cheekbones and down his neck.

Hips moving shamelessly to chase every tug of Goro's hand, Ren is beautiful like this — breathtaking, even — and he stores the image away greedily, like a guarded secret. He swallows the lump forming in his throat and focuses instead on the way Ren's eyes roll in their sockets when Goro pulls his hair just as he rubs his thumb across the head of his cock, where it's deliciously slick with pre-cum.

"Look at you…" Goro breathes, but the words come out too fond, and he quickly switches gears to hide it, curling his lip and sneering, "So desperate, it's embarrassing."

That earns him a deep moan, and Goro's all too happy to play it up — laughing cruelly and increasing the speed of his fist until Ren is shaking, eyebrows knit together and pretty mouth slack in pleasure. Already, the muscles in his legs and stomach are tensing up, trembling so nicely that it's obvious his orgasm is approaching.

So Goro leans in, bites at the shell of Ren's ear, and whispers, "You're disgusting."

And that does it. Ren comes apart in his hand with a shaky, broken cry, hips bucking erratically and chest heaving as he spills over Goro's fist.

Once he's completely spent, Goro tuts, "Look at the mess you made…"

And, releasing the fistful of thick hair he's still holding, he reaches down to pull the waistband of Ren's sweatpants out — hopefully allowing him to extract his other hand without smearing cum absolutely everywhere. Goro is still in control of the situation. Certainly, he does not become flustered by the brief glimpse he gets of dark pubic hair and the still half-hard cock standing out against it.

He's about to start looking for a napkin — something to wipe up the mess — when Ren suddenly moves, catching his wrist again. His gaze is clear now and bright with mischief, and Goro watches with wide eyes as his hand is brought to that devious mouth. Ren doesn't break eye contact as he runs his tongue up and between Goro's fingers, getting every last drop of cum before sucking his index finger into his mouth slowly.

The power shift is like something physical in the air, and just like that, Goro feels his indifferent façade evaporate completely — far too distracted by the promise that clever tongue is making around his finger.

Ren releases the digit with an obscenely wet pop. That smug little smirk is playing at the corners of his mouth again.

"I'm going to make you feel so good, Goro."

The sound of his given name coming out of Ren's mouth for the first time probably shouldn't affect him as much as it does, but it still sends a pleasant thrum of pleasure through him.

It's almost enough to disguise the painful throb in his chest.

Because it feels too… intimate, doesn't it? Which, given the position they're currently in, is an absolutely idiotic way to find himself feeling.

However, his treacherous thoughts are quickly being supplanted by sheer, burning anticipation. Ren's mouth is on his again, and the hot, wet slide of his tongue is salty with the taste of his own cum — something that Goro is finding he enjoys far more than he ever thought he would.

There are quick, deft fingers tugging at the buckle of his belt and undoing his fly. Goro thinks that he might combust.

Ren nips gently at his lower lip before he pulls back, and Goro watches with rapt fascination as he drops to his knees, swallowing a groan when Ren leans forward to mouth over the bulge of his erection through his underwear. And, despite his best efforts, Ren must still have heard him, because he chuckles, deep in his chest, and just the vibration of it against his cock has Goro biting his lip, hard, so that he doesn't cry out and embarrass himself any more than he already has.

"Do you really think you can be quiet?" Ren purrs, smooth as the devil, as he pulls down the front of Goro's underwear with one hand and grasps his cock with the other as it bobs free. Seeming as confident as ever when it comes to working with his hands, Ren immediately starts pumping him slowly, firmly, in a way that makes Goro's brain fucking fizz.

He desperately wants to say something — anything — to regain the upper hand, but his thoughts seem to have turned slow and sticky, like treacle, and the most he can manage is a hitching, gasping breath as his hands flex uselessly at his sides.

And any further attempt to conserve his dignity flies out the window entirely when Ren finally takes him into his mouth, almost all the way to the hilt, and a mortifyingly lewd-sounding moan escapes from him before he can get a knuckle between his teeth to try stifle it. Feeling himself flush with mortification and arousal when Ren laughs around him, Goro's toes curl in his shoes, and he has to grip the bar behind him with one hand just to stay vertical.

"Shut up!" he hisses, knowing that most of the threat in his tone is undermined by how breathy it comes out.

Ren pulls up and off him with a torturously slow suck, looking up at him through criminally thick lashes as he peppers the underside of his erection with wet kisses. "I didn't say anything?"

Goro opens his mouth, fully intending to threaten to murder him again, but all that comes out is another choked gasp when Ren runs his tongue in a lazy circle around the head of his cock and then down in a firm strip to the base.

His brain might as well be melting, Goro manages to think, as he watches Ren slowly kiss and lick his way up and down the length of his cock before pulling him back into that silky, wet heat once more. This time, it seems like Ren's done with the teasing, as he settles into a languid, but steady pace, head bobbing up and down, all while his tongue does amazing things to the underside of Goro's cock on each drag upwards.

He can feel the pleasure coiling like a spring in the pit of his stomach; every single one of his nerves might as well be on fire, and it takes every remaining scrap of his willpower not to thrust in time with Ren's movements. Not out of any real consideration for his well-being, mind you — the sadistic part of him loves the idea of making Ren splutter and choke on his cock — it's more that Goro can't relinquish any more control than he already has. Particularly now, when he's hurtling towards the edge, and he feels like he might just shake apart with it.

And it must be clear how close he is because Ren makes an eager humming sound in the back of his throat and increases that delicious suction, slipping a hand up the inside of his thigh to cup his balls roughly, and that's it — Goro doesn't feel like he falls off the edge so much as he's kicked off it. His vision goes white, eyes rolling back into his head, as he's hit by the most intense orgasm of his fucking life. Only just managing to get his fist back up to his mouth to sink his teeth in, he tries desperately to cover the shameful mix of gasps and grunts he's making as he shoots down Ren's throat. Biting down hard enough on his knuckle to actually taste blood.

Feeling boneless and oversensitive as he comes back down, Goro shivers at the almost painful overstimulation when Ren gives him one last lick before tucking him back into his underwear. He zips up Goro's fly and looks up at him with wide, beautiful eyes, and something approaching reverence.

Goro has to look away.

With the heavy haze of aggressive arousal gone, there's nothing to distract him from the fragile thing determined to dash itself against the walls of his chest. His vision is still blurry around the edges, and he blinks deliberately in an attempt to clear it.

An icy finger of dread ghosts up his spine when the first tear falls.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!

The well of his anger is suddenly and completely dry, for the first time in... he's not exactly sure how long, and he's utterly lost without it to hide everything else behind.

Ren stands and catches his chin, forcing him to make eye contact. God, he looks so concerned.

Goro feels less than worthy.

"You're crying..." Ren says, voice far too soft and caring as he swipes a thumb over Goro's cheek, smearing the wet trail there.

"Yes… I suppose that I am." He tries to twist his features into a smile and force out a laugh, but the expression feels brittle, and the sound that comes out of him is far too close to a hiccup, so he gives up and lets his face settle into the scowl it wants to be instead.

More fat tears roll down his cheeks when he blinks again, and he's suddenly terrified that now he's started he won't be able to fucking stop.

"Shit!" he whispers sharply, grinding the heels of his hands into his eyes, which, of course, only serves to dislodge even more water from his treacherous tear ducts.

Fucking fantastic.

Truly, the universe seems to be determined to strip him of every last shred of his dignity.

But then, perplexingly, Ren pulls him into a fierce hug, and Goro fights him at first — more out of reflex than anything else — pushing at him ineffectually. He knows he doesn't have the right to seek comfort from Ren, after everything, and he still rails viscerally against the idea that he might be pitied…

But he's just so tired.

Goro realises that he can't even begin to remember the last time someone hugged him, or even touched him for anything more than a handshake, which just makes him feel even more wretched.

And hasn't he already spent most of his life making poor choices and selfish decisions? Is there really any reason or point in stopping now?

So he surrenders. Clutching at Ren like a drowning man, fists bunching in the material of his sweatshirt as he shudders with the force of a sob. He hasn't cried this openly since his mother died, and of course it's Ren that yanks it out of him like a rotten tooth. Having always been infuriatingly efficient at finding any gap in Goro's armour, pulling and tearing it away like a shadow's mask and leaving him feeling exposed and raw around the edges.

Chapter Text

If asked, Ren doesn't think he'd say that he's surprised that Akechi broke down after everything that's happened. He's probably the single most emotionally constipated person Ren knows, and it was always going to boil and bubble over at some point. It's just, well, he'd always kind of assumed that any outbursts from Akechi would be more, uh, violent… rather than of the 'dissolving into floods of tears' variety.

Don't get him wrong, he's not complaining, as such; Akechi crying is definitely a lot easier to deal with than him losing his shit. And Ren's no therapist, but crying has to be a million times better than hiding behind all that fake cheer and polite indifference, right?

It's just, uh… Ren's kind of worried that he's broken him or something.

As if on cue, Akechi lets out an especially ragged and forceful series of sobs, each one sounding like it's literally being punched out of him. Taking a deep breath and pulling him a little closer, Ren runs his fingers through the hair at the nape of Akechi's neck in a way that he hopes is soothing.

Coming down the stairs earlier, Ren would be lying if he said that he hadn't been feeling more than a little lost, but he's always been very good at thinking on his feet, faking it until he makes it, and just generally flying by the seat of his pants. That's why, even though he's running on negative sleep, he still had a plan. It'd been hastily put together and only minutes old when it fell apart, sure, but he had one.

But hey, it hadn't included any angry making out, getting jerked off, or giving head for the first time — so maybe it hadn't been such a good plan after all.

No.

He gives himself a mental slap on the wrist.

Focus.

His plan (the one where they actually spoke, instead of trying to eat each other's faces) was supposed to be an opportunity to talk things out. Not just about everything from the Velvet Room, but also about all the other stuff that they'd never had the chance to actually discuss properly.

Like, how many people had Akechi actually killed or driven mad?

Was there anything that Ren could have said or done in November that would have convinced Akechi to join them for real?

What had it felt like to murder him?

Did he regret any of it?

And did it make Ren a bad person for caring more about Akechi being here and safe than any of those things?

It had been going kind of well. At first. They managed to talk a little about the engine room and even the whole 'trying to kill him' thing, but then Akechi had started getting mad and Ren couldn't help himself. Feeling like a cat eyeing something expensive near the edge of the countertop, he had to poke and prod until every piece of Akechi's well-structured veneer was thoroughly smashed on the figurative floor.

But while getting a reaction out of Akechi had been the point, Ren never would have expected him to become so openly angry — especially to the point that he'd get into his personal space — eyes ablaze with a not-so-righteous fury as he grabbed a fistful of Ren's hair.

(It was kind of uncanny, really. He might as well have reached into Ren's head and plucked a script straight out of one of his dirty dreams.)

Then the anger broke, and Akechi had gotten this look on his face, all flushed cheeks and wide, panicked eyes. Making it very clear, very quickly, that Ren really hadn't been imagining the furtive glances at him across the table in Jazz Jin, or overthinking the vicious chemistry when they fought side by side in the Metaverse.

The rational part of Ren's brain had taken the opportunity to go on vacation, like a shadow had slapped him with a Marin Karin and left him so brainwashed that it seemed like a great idea to let all the talking and the questions wait until after he'd kissed the sour look off that pretty face.

Tapping into a bit of his Joker persona had helped him keep his nerve, and he'd needed it, even though it wasn't like it was his first kiss or even his first handjob. He'd had a girlfriend back home, Hitomi — she was smart and sweet, and he thought they were good together. Right up until, y'know, she ghosted him the second he got arrested.

And yeah, he's still kind of bitter about that. The least she could have done was actually break up with him, instead of just acting like he'd never existed.

Not that she'd ever kissed him the way Akechi did, no — he was very... bitey, like they were fighting instead of making out, and it was insanely hot. Ren is having to admit to himself that he has a whole host of embarrassingly masochistic tendencies that he never thought he'd have the opportunity to explore in real life. Like how much he'd get off to having sweetly degrading things whispered in his ear, or how he couldn't decide if he preferred the way Akechi surrendered to him the second he dropped to his knees, or if he'd wanted him to just fuck his mouth until he could barely breathe.

Akechi shifts in his arms then, pressing a wet cheek to the side of his neck, and it's the equivalent of having a cold bucket of water dumped over his head. Ren feels immediately and immensely bad for letting his mind trip and face-plant into the gutter again, while Akechi is literally crying into his shoulder.

He's going to blame the fact that he's half asleep, and the way that Akechi smells stupidly good for someone who's been stuck outside reality for months.

And actually, hang on — how exactly does that work?

The bottle of water he'd given Akechi earlier is still sitting on the bar, unopened, so it's probably pretty safe to say that he's not dying of thirst or hunger. Not something you'd expect from someone who has had no access to food and water for way longer than should be humanly possible. And that's not the only thing that doesn't add up, either. His uniform is still clean, crisp and immaculately pressed, not anywhere near as gross as you'd expect, given the fact he's been wearing it for months.

It's as if no physical time at all has passed for Akechi since December.

Ren supposes that Igor was being literal when he said that the Velvet Room exists 'between' dream and reality.

He's had a little experience with it himself, of course — sometimes spending hours in the Velvet Room, trying to perfect a specific Persona fusion, only to leave and get ragged on by his friends for 'spacing out' for a few minutes. Time in the real world and time in the Velvet Room seem to be entirely separate, but still, there's obviously a huge difference between a few hours and months of missing time.

It makes his head hurt, and even if Ren were more awake, he feels like trying to understand it all is above his non-existent pay grade.

Honestly, he feels a little like he's been turned into a yo-yo. Everything has been so up and down since he got into bed a few hours ago, and they're not even done yet. Not really. Not when the looming spectre of Tomorrow, and how exactly all of this is going to work in the light of day, are still up in the air.

The only thing keeping him sane, in the face of it all, is that he has Akechi — Goro, he corrects himself — here with him, a solid and reassuring weight in his arms.

It's hard to say how long they stand there against the bar, not exactly anyway, as he strokes Goro's hair with one hand and holds him tightly against him with the other. His own eyes are wet and bleary, and he catches himself falling asleep on his feet more than once.

If Ren's feeling this physically and emotionally wrung out, he can only imagine what it must be like for Goro.

So when the worst of the storm seems to have passed, and Goro is silent other than for the occasional soft sniffle, Ren decides to take a chance and see if he can coax him upstairs — genuinely surprised, and maybe even a little worried, when Goro comes without a fight, only stopping to pick his discarded glove up off the floor on the way.

There's no sign of Morgana when they get up there, and Ren has to assume that he slipped out through the open window. He pushes aside any thoughts about why his friend felt the need to leave in the small hours of the morning. It's not something he has the headspace for right now, not on top of everything else, and let's be real, he already knows the answer anyway.

It's not like they'd been especially quiet, after all.

He doesn't need one of Chihaya's readings to tell him that there's a massive sushi bill in his future, is what he's saying.

Ren walks Goro to the bed and, with a gentle hand on his shoulder, guides him into sitting down on the edge of the mattress, thrown again by the pliant way he just goes with it. Ren's used to having to push with him — even back when Goro was still pretending to be the sweet little media darling, every innocuous action Ren made had still been taken as a challenge.

What if he really has broken him? What if he sucked the rage right out of him like some kind of, uh... succubus?

It's a very dumb thought, one that catches him completely off guard, and he only just manages to hide a giggle behind a (hopefully convincing) cough at the last second. Laughter doesn't seem like something that would go down especially well at the moment.

He badly needs to get some sleep before he says or does something really stupid and ends up murdered for real.

"I'm just going to get us some clothes to sleep in, okay?" Ren says carefully, proud of how it comes out without a hint of the tired hysteria he's feeling. Goro blinks up at him with red, puffy eyes, looking slightly disoriented, before he nods and moves to start unlacing his shoes.

Leaving him to it, Ren heads over to root around in the cardboard box that functions as his wardrobe, fishing out a t-shirt and two pairs of sweatpants, and entirely exhausting his supply of clean sleepwear in the process. Which sucks, he hadn't been planning on having to do any more laundry before leaving Tokyo—

And he catches himself, cutting his own thought right off at the root. He's not thinking about going home now.

Tomorrow.

Ren changes his pants quickly and kicks the dirty pair to the side. They land in a crumpled (definitely sticky and soon-to-be crusty) pile beside his model of the Skytree.

One more thing for Tomorrow Ren to worry about.

Walking back across the room, he hands Goro the change of clothes, feeling a little of his concern ease when Goro pulls a face as he accepts them. Mouth turning down at the corners in distaste, as if Ren just gave him a trash bag to wear.

They'd probably have to be argyle and look like something a middle-aged philosophy professor would wear to get the Goro Akechi seal of approval anyway.

"Sorry, I'm sure they're not up to your usual standards," he teases, and when Goro shoots him a look with some of his usual fire, the tight ball of worry in Ren's chest relaxes a little more.

"I'll manage."

It's kind of awkward, as Goro stands and starts getting undressed. Meticulously folding and setting aside each piece of clothing as it's removed, he stows them in a neat little pile between the miniature swan boat and the model ramen bowl on Ren's shelf. Of course, they've gotten changed in front of each other before at the bathhouse, and it feels weird to be shy when he literally just had Goro's dick in his mouth downstairs, but there's this fragility about him since he started crying. Like fine cracks in glass that will only spread if you put pressure on them, and Ren isn't sure where to look — so he busies himself with getting into bed (not bothering to turn off the lamp before he does), and plugging his phone back in to charge instead.

The screen lights up, and he notes the time (4:25 a.m.) with dismay, there's only about two hours left before Sojiro arrives and starts puttering about downstairs, getting the café ready for the handful of regulars who like to grab a cup of coffee before work.

He wants to stay in this bubble with Goro a little longer.

As if summoned by the thought, a chat notification pops up (silently) on his phone, and he taps it warily. He's suddenly very grateful that Morgana bullied him into setting his phone to 'do not disturb' last night, so that none of his friends could... Well, disturb him. Hoping it would let him get a proper night's sleep for once — which is actually kind of hilarious in hindsight. It means that he doesn't have to worry about explaining to Goro why his phone is going off at half four in the morning. Especially when he knows that there's only going to be one person messaging him at this hour.

Sure enough, Futaba's icon stares up at him knowingly from the screen.

Ren has a minor existential crisis when he remembers that she has the café bugged.

-Futaba Sakura-
19/03/2017
4:27 a.m.

Futaba: Mona is here with me if ur looking for him...
Futaba: tell Akechi congrats on the respawn I guess
┐(￣ヘ￣;)┌
Futaba: ...

A few seconds tick by while she obviously writes, erases and rewrites whatever it is she wants to say next. Trying to ignore the apprehension twisting his stomach into a pretzel, Ren is just really, really glad that Goro seems to be too absorbed in getting dressed to pay attention to what he's doing.

Futaba: if playing visual novels has taught me anything its that going the yandere route usually gets u the Bad End
〣( ºΔº )〣
Futaba: just be careful ok?

A wave of fondness overrides the little bit of panicky embarrassment he's feeling. He's not sure if Morgana blabbed or if she actually overheard something, but it means so much to him that she seems to be okay enough with it to make a joke at his expense. Sending a single thumbs-up emoji back, mostly because he doesn't know what else to say ('Thanks for being cool with me blowing the guy who killed your mom'?) Ren turns his screen off and sets his phone aside.

"I have a spare charger if you need it," Ren offers, trying to distract himself by pulling the second cable from where it's fallen down the side of the bed. Just like he's done a million times when Ryuji or Yusuke stay over, and he's hit all over again with how incredibly weird this all is.

Which, considering the year he's had, is saying a lot.

"Ah, thank you," Goro says, sounding surprised and sincerely grateful as he hands his phone over for Ren to plug in. He's dressed in Ren's clothes now, one hand worrying at a hole along the bottom seam of the old t-shirt, and Ren's heart does a funny little jump at how cute he looks.

It's a sharp contrast with the smug snake who jerked him off to within an inch of his life downstairs, that's for sure.

It's something he should probably be used to by now — the way Goro can be so many seemingly contradictory things at the same time — but it still catches him off guard all the same. And maybe it's the sleep deprivation, the post-orgasm brain fuzz, or the emotional toll of the night as a whole, but he has a feeling that he's falling — and falling hard — for a pretty-boy hitman with serious Daddy Issues.

His parents would pitch a fit.

Ren realises, with no real surprise, that the idea of disappointing his parents bothers him a lot less now than it would have a year ago.

"Should I sleep on the sofa? Or...?" Goro starts, sounding unsure of himself, and he's literally wringing the end of the t-shirt in his hands now, knuckles white with the effort.

Ren is almost tempted to mess with him, maybe even start pulling out the spare futon that he eventually invested in for the more platonic kinds of sleepovers, but he feels like any jokes might fall a bit flat right now, so, he just scoots over close to the wall and pats the space on the mattress beside him.

He isn't sure how someone can look both relieved and offended at the same time, but Goro manages it. Resting one knee on the edge of the bed, he gingerly shifts his weight into it, like he's testing its structural integrity.

"I can't believe you actually sleep on a mattress that's, what...? On top of old milk crates? Will it even hold the two of us?"

"It's fine," Ren laughs under his breath. His bed has supported the weight of pretty much the entire band of Phantom Thieves at some point — all squashed up together watching movies on his tiny CRT — but he doesn't want to get into that now. Instead, he reaches out and pulls Goro down into his arms, so they're nose to nose, tangling their legs together without thinking, as if he's subconsciously afraid that Goro is going to hop up and run away (or disappear into thin air again) if he doesn't.

Which doesn't feel like an especially irrational fear, actually, what with everything that's happened.

Taking both of Goro's hands in his own, Ren kisses the tips of his fingers softly, mostly out of genuine affection, but also because doing it makes Goro's face scrunch up hilariously.

"You're disgustingly sentimental, do you know that?" Goro says, and it shouldn't be possible for him to look down his nose at Ren — not with the position they're in — but he certainly seems to be trying his best anyway.

"Mmm," Ren hums, placing an especially gentle kiss on the bite mark on Goro's finger, because wow he really went to town on it earlier. "You might have mentioned that once or twice before."

Reaching out to brush some of the hair out of Goro's face, Ren gently tucks a few of the loose strands behind his ear. The way Goro is watching him intensely, obviously perplexed by the simple affection, makes Ren's heart clench painfully.

"I don't understand you," Goro whispers into the half-inch of space between them. "I spent years building up this false version of myself, not just because it made what I had to do easier, but I suppose... that I wanted to be... likeable, or at least useful. How can you have seen who I am under all of it and still…" He pauses to take a shaky breath. "And still look at me like that? As if I actually deserve it?"

Wow, if Ren thought his heart hurt before, he was wrong.

It's all too easy, right? To remember the broken boy screaming at him and the other Thieves in Shido's Palace, with literally everything laid bare — all the hate, the deception, the loneliness, and the sheer inability to understand that they would still want him to come with them after all of it. Like a wild animal caught in a trap that would rather gnaw its own leg off than accept help, or compassion, because it had never actually been shown any before.

He thinks back to the evening when he'd given Maruki the calling card. Standing alone with Goro after the 'dead all along' bomb was dropped, feeling like his heart was breaking and desperately trying to think of anything to say that would make things right — telling Goro his life wasn't something trivial and the poison hiss of 'it is' that he'd gotten in return.

"Because you do deserve it," Ren tries, and watches as Goro's mouth hitches into a half-hearted sneer. It's only for a second, though, before his expression relaxes back into something more pensive than angry. Still, Ren kind of feels like he's in a minefield, trying to avoid mentioning anything that might scare or set him off.

"You're not as good an actor as you think, Goro." And, wow, okay, that was the wrong thing to say — at least if the thunderous expression Goro is currently sporting is anything to go by. Ren pushes on, and hopes that the rest of what he has to say does a better job of getting what he actually means across. "Not up close, anyway. You showed me a lot more of yourself than you meant to — and I don't just mean in the bathhouse."

He says the last part with a suggestive eyebrow waggle, and Goro rolls his eyes and digs a painfully sharp heel into the side of Ren's shin, but his mouth is twisted in what looks like an attempt to hide a smile.

"Ow! Okay, I'll stop!" Ren laughs and takes the brief moment of levity as an opportunity to plant a small kiss on the tip of Goro's nose. "Seriously, though. You're allowed to be happy."

And Goro immediately looks sullen again, because the idea that he should be anything other than miserable is the worst thing that Ren could have said, apparently. He's floundering a little here. It doesn't help that he's never really been all that great at carrying a conversation, usually preferring to be a sort of sounding board for his friends and their problems.

Thankfully, Goro has never been one to stay quiet for long.

"Do you think that Futaba Sakura or Haru Okumura would agree with you? What would they say if they could see you now? Cosying—" Goro says it like it's a dirty word, mouth twisting into a snarl around it. "—up to the person who killed their parents? And let's not forget the other Phantom Thieves! Don't you think that they might have an issue with your suicidal obsession with your own murderer?"

Ouch.

Okay, that's just unfair.

"Any obsession here is definitely at least a two-way street," Ren says, aiming for something in the region of light teasing, but definitely ending up sounding more defensive than anything else. "You pretty much stalked me for months!"

"I was investigating you, which is hardly the sa—"

"The train that goes to your school doesn't even leave from the same platform as mine, Goro — I checked! And then you just turn up here one day, out of the blue — even though Yongen-Jaya is completely out of your way — and I'm not sure that I'd even told you the name of the café I was staying at yet."

"Sae-san recommended— and actually, no, I won't even dignify that with a response." Goro is suddenly all business, mouth set in a grim and unyielding line, and Ren knows he's hit a nerve. "Stop deflecting and answer the question, Ren."

He's using what Ren has to assume is his actual detective voice, not the way he speaks as a smiling TV personality, but rather the tone he probably reserves for when he's doing real work with the police and has to hold his own against a bunch of condescending adults.

It's kind of hot.

Then again, Ren's frazzled brain offers, maybe it's also how he speaks to people's shadow selves when he's pumping them for information. Before turning them berserk, or just straight up destroying them.

Probably by putting a bullet between their eyes.

Just like he'd done to the cognitive version of Ren in that interrogation room.

Okay, less hot.

"They probably wouldn't be, uh, thrilled about it, no," Ren admits with a humourless little laugh. He doesn't mention that Futaba already knows. That just feels like an extra complication that they don't need right now. "But they're my friends, and they'd understand."

"They'd understand?"

"It's not like they haven't already figured it out, okay?" Ren's really trying not to sound as exasperated as he feels, but he's not any good at explaining at the best of times, and his brain feels like it's running at half capacity right now. "After we beat Maruki-sensei, I woke up in juvenile detention, and you were just gone, and Morgana was the one that had to tell everyone why. They know that you were able to be there with us in January because I... uh... wished for it. They know that you were — are important to me, although, I guess I don't know if they figured out in what way... but, yeah... they, uh, they get it."

He's making it sound easier than it really was. When his welcome back party had started winding down and Goro's name came up (in an awkwardly endearing toast from Ryuji, of all people), and Ren had suddenly found himself very close to actually crying.

Because, yeah, he'd been through a lot, and Goro really was gone, and saying it all really sucked would have been the understatement of the century — but, honestly, he'd actually been more worried that the whole 'wishing their enemy back from the dead' thing was going to be what smashed the easy camaraderie he shared with the other Thieves. And that wasn't even getting into how much he'd felt like a hypocrite, spending borrowed time with the person he'd lost, after forcing the others to abandon their 'ideal' realities weeks before the fight with Maruki.

He'd tried his best — both to explain it to them and to apologise — but then he really had started crying, and by the time he finished talking, there'd been this heavy, awkward silence in the air. Thankfully, though, it had only lasted a few seconds, before Haru reached out to him and took his hand in her own. Her eyes were full of nothing but sympathy and compassion, and, of course, when he looked up he found the same thing in all of them.

Then they'd all pulled him into a big, messy group hug and nearly crushed the life (and the tears) out of him. Ren remembers feeling terrible all over again for thinking that they would ever actually hold how he felt against him.

They really are the best friends he could ever ask for.

And Ren still struggles with the concept of unconditional acceptance, even with such great friends. So, given what he knows about Goro's life, he really shouldn't be surprised by how he's currently looking at Ren like he's speaking a different language, eyebrows all knit together in complete and utter confusion.

"That's—" Goro starts, but then stops and seems to think better of it, sighing in what sounds like defeat. "I suppose I'll have to take your word for it."

Ren is about to hum an affirmative, but a yawn creeps up on him, and he has to turn to the side and into the pillow at the last second so that he doesn't do it right into Goro's face.

Goro, for his part, makes a soft amused noise through his nose and quirks an eyebrow at him. "I think you need to go to sleep."

"I'm kind of worried that you'll be gone when I wake up if I do." And whoops, he didn't mean to say that out loud.

(Just one more thing to add to the list of Things Ren is Blaming on Lack of Sleep.)

"Don't be stupid," Goro tuts, unimpressed. "I'm not planning on going anywhere."

It should probably feel like a meaningless assurance — the boy in his bed is a liar before he's anything else, after all — but it still calms Ren's nerves enough that he allows his eyes to drift closed.

"Goro?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm glad you're not dead."

Goro's hand flexes in his own, and he makes a small sound that's somewhere between a sigh and a sniffle. "Go to sleep, Ren."

And, despite the fact that he's kind of amped up from being overtired, there's a foot jammed awkwardly behind his knee, and there really isn't enough room in the bed (or on his single small pillow) to fit two taller-than-average teenage boys comfortably, he feels oddly at peace. His nose is full of the warm, sandalwood smell of Goro's cologne, and there's a thumb rubbing soft, soothing circles into the back of his hand.

Sleep comes quickly and easily for him for what feels like the first time in forever.

Chapter Text

Futaba Sakura sits up straight in her desk chair, taking a second to uncurl her spine and stretch her arms and legs as far as they'll go. Trying to flex the stiffness out of her muscles, and enjoying the prickly tingle of pins and needles she gets in return.

She's just set a tonne of code to compile, and there isn't really much she can do now, other than wait around while it does its thing.

It's almost 3:00 a.m. and she wants to go see Ren in the morning before he heads off to say goodbye to all the NPCs he's befriended around Tokyo. That means she either needs to try and get some shut-eye now, or just stay awake until Sojiro starts serving breakfast at Leblanc.

She flips a mental coin.

It lands on sleep.

Which honestly, yeah, that's probably for the best. She doesn't want to waste Ren's last proper day in Tokyo acting like one of the zombies from the Running Dead.

Taking off her glasses and headphones, she grabs her phone to turn on her alarm, and winces a little as she sets it to go off at half seven. Gross, she can't even remember the last time she had to get up so early…

Alarm set!

Pointy, poky head accessories safely put aside!

Time for bed!

Futaba spins her chair away from the desk and starts to stand up, only to flop back down again immediately when she realises that she forgot one important little detail.

Her bed is a total mess.

No exaggeration, the sheets are barely visible. Buried under manga volumes, computer parts, and the stack of clean laundry that Sojiro asked her to put away when he came home to check on her and give her some dinner, hours ago.

Now what? Her sneak skill is way too low to even try and do something about it, not without risking waking Sojiro up anyway, so the bed is definitely not an option…

Meh, comfort, and proper back support are overrated anyways, right?

Pulling the cushion out from behind her back, she plops it down on the desk, and fluffs it up a little so the mascot face that decorates it doesn't look so sad and squished, before she lies down.

Several restless, sleepless minutes drag by, and each one that passes makes her feel more and more like she's made the wrong choice here. Her brain just feels twitchy and way too on to actually go to sleep. Which, uh, probably has something to do with the three cans of Mad Bull she'd downed earlier to replenish her MP, back when she was really in the zone.

Might as well have drunk 100% fresh R.E.G.R.E.T. juice instead.

Crud.

As she tries again to get comfortable, her eyes land on one of her smaller monitors, where she still has the program she uses to mirror her friend's phones open. It looks really blurry without her glasses on, but she knows that it just shows their lock-screens right now anyway — nothing interesting — because they've all been asleep for hours, like a bunch of nerds.

Even with the fuzziness, she also knows that each screen features some variation of a Phantom Thieves group photo.

The one exception to the rule is the blacked-out rectangle at the bottom right of the window, a blank feed that used to mirror Akechi's screen. Sure, she could have removed it after he went dark, but it felt kind of wrong, for some reason, and she ended up keeping it there. Just in case he turned back up after all, maybe — or even as a small memorial to him.

She knows that he never got a proper one in reality.

And yeah, he might have been a murdering asshole, but after they'd unlocked his Tragic Backstory, he sacrificed himself for them, and then came back from the dead to help them with Maruki... He'd become their murdering asshole? Kind of?

Then he died again.

Or went back to being dead.

Or something.

GG Akechi.

The only thing she's really sure of — when it comes to him, at least — is that he doesn't deserve to be forgotten.

They've never really talked about it, but she knows that Ren understands where she's coming from, better than anybody, probably — because, sure, he's got his own Akechi Stuff, but if empathy was a stat, then Ren's would be maxed out and then some. He gets Futaba, is the point — even more so than the rest of their friends — and he'd take one look at that dead feed and understand exactly why she'd kept it there.

Ugh, it's going to be so weird when Ren's actually gone.

How is she ever supposed to learn how to interact with other people without the passive bonuses granted by her trusty Key Item?

Futaba blinks blearily at the fuzzy collage of smiling faces on her monitor, and blows some of the hair out of her face. Her sleep progress bar still feels like it's stuck and frozen somewhere around 90%, all because of her bad energy-drink-related decisions.

Years ago, when she was still small, her mom used to tell her she'd jinx herself if she thought about how tired she was when she couldn't sleep — that she should always try and think of something else. Maybe if she runs her own little flashback episode in her head (easy-peasy when you've got an eidetic memory like Futaba does), it'll help to dispel the caffeine buff buzzing through her veins and let her actually power down and catch some Zs.

It's worth a try, right?

Closing her eyes again, she lets her mind drift back over the almost year since Ren first came to stay in Leblanc, back when she was still relying on the handful of bugs dotted throughout the café to watch over Sojiro. Worried sick about him taking in some random juvenile delinquent, Futaba had reacted to the news the same way she did to everything — booting up her machine and getting to digging.

After all the quests she used to do with Medjed, accessing Ren's police record was like playing on ultra-easy mode. (Seriously, what the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department calls a 'security system' is a freaking joke.) It was a lot harder, though, to connect the violent assault she read about in his file with the quiet boy she overheard learning the ropes from Sojiro, and having way too many detailed and one-sided conversations with his cat.

He hadn't seemed dangerous at all, just like a total dweeb who was lonely, and kind of weird.

And well, she'd been able to relate, for obvious reasons, especially to the whole 'talking to someone who couldn't actually answer you back' thing. It was around that time that she had really begun seeing and hearing her dead mom, after all.

Then, later on, when things had gotten even worse and her cognition was completely messed up, she'd used the same bugs to listen in on what she quickly learned were Phantom Thief meetings, and more importantly, a potential way out. It was pure desperation that pushed her to use Leblanc's Wi-Fi as a bridge to get into their phones, needing to verify that they really were the PT and not just kids that were really into LARPing or something.

Making contact with them still ranks as one of the hardest things she's ever had to do, but it worked! They infiltrated her Palace. She levelled up and joined them for the epic Boss Battle — becoming a real, bona fide Phantom Thief with an awesome costume and everything!

And if her friends have ever had a problem with the fact that she's continued spying on them, long after her distortion was resolved, they've never said anything.

It only seems fair anyway, when they've all literally been inside her head.

Well, that's always been her reasoning at least, and it's more than enough to toggle the 'guilt' setting in her head to 'off', even if it doesn't quite explain away the fact that she also hacked into Haru's phone the second the opportunity presented itself. Haru, who is sweet, trusting to a fault, and the literal definition of a cinnamon roll.

Haru, who had, most importantly, never set a dainty foot in Futaba's Palace.

Although, with the sheer amount of phishing emails and adware that Futaba is constantly having to nuke from orbit on her behalf, maybe she can say she's doing Haru a service by keeping tabs on her.

She looks out for all of them as best she can, really, just like she does in the Metaverse — trawling for little bits of information to make their lives easier.

It's how she found out that Ryuji and Makoto have the same taste in manga and movies (the kind that are all about sweaty, ripped dudes grunting at each other while stuff explodes in the background), and why she'd started sending them promotional materials from the same theatres. Now they regularly 'accidentally' bump into each other, and go geek-out together. Although maybe it worked a little too well? She's seen the log from the boy's group chat and knows that Ryuji is crushing (and hoo-boy, is he crushing) on Makoto now.

Whoops?

Ann has a super busy schedule and negative organisational skills, so Futaba edits her calendar to set reminders. Making sure she doesn't forget to go to her shoots, or miss the days when her favourite crêpe shop is running special offers or serving limited edition flavours. Ann almost always buys extra to share with Futaba too, and it's a lot of fun playing taste-tester together, even if the weird savoury crêpe she got last time was super gross. Ann had enjoyed the tuna-filled ick enough for the both of them anyways.

But it's her latest project that she's especially proud of: rigging restaurant and grocery store coupon draws, and sending the spoils on to Inari — who still hasn't started questioning how he's winning competitions that he never entered in the first place.

Then there's Sumire.

Sumire's phone is a special case. It's so broken, and so malware-infested, that Futaba hasn't had the courage to remote in and expose her system to whatever demons have possessed it. She should really set up an isolated environment and convince Sumire to let her fix it, or at least back it up, so she can get a new phone... but that would involve actually talking to her, and then they'd probably have to spend time alone together in Futaba's room while she does the repairs. She wouldn't even have anyone to help sponge any awkward silences between them, since Mona is going to be leaving with Ren on Monday.

And maybe it's just because Sumire is the newest member of the group or something, but Futaba feels kind of like her heart is trying to jackhammer its way out of her chest whenever she tries to talk to her without the other Thieves around.

Turning her face into the pillow, Futaba groans. Her cheeks are suddenly very hot (like a bajillion degrees hot!), and she doesn't understand why.

At the very least, she should be able to skip the first part of the Companion Quest by getting Ren to bring fixing the phone up with Sumire for her. He should be more than happy to do her a solid once she lets him know that she's upgraded his train ticket to first class, and filled a memory stick with hours of awesome anime to keep him distracted on the journey home.

(Not that he'll actually need either of those things if Makoto's road trip plan gets off the ground, but while Futaba herself might hoard info like a dragon, she otherwise operates on a strict need-to-know basis, and for her fix-Sumire's-phone-without-actually-asking-her plan to work, this is definitely something that Ren does not need to know.)

So, yeah, she spies on her friends, but it's not like they don't know she's doing it, and she always makes sure to turn off the display when one of them starts browsing in incognito mode — because they're poor, innocent, little nooblets who genuinely think that using private tabs will actually hide what they're doing.

Honestly, she doesn't even really know why she watches them constantly. It's a bit like the compulsive need to get all the collectables in a game, even when there's no achievement for it.

Futaba has always been a completionist at heart.

And if the information she gleans from their browsing history also works as a sort of strategy guide for interacting with them? Welp, that's just an added bonus.

The only time that she actually felt like she was being some creeper, honestly, was when her Akechi surveillance really kicked off back in November. It wasn't like it was avoidable, though. They knew that he was hiding something, and that the something was big. They had been right, obviously, and spying on him had turned out to be a literal 'life or death' thing for Ren, but even so, she still feels pretty bad about some of the stuff that she saw and heard while she was watching him.

When Ren first asked her to hack into Akechi's phone, she'd been too proud to mention the fact that she had actually already tried, and failed, several times. The thing was, Akechi was mega cagey with his phone, and she hadn't been able to get into it using her normal methods.

Did he connect to Leblanc's Wi-Fi when he was in the café?

Nope.

Did he open any of the attachments in the official-looking emails she sent to the address off of his dorky little business cards?

Nope again.

And even though most dummies who wear smartwatches just leave their Bluetooth on all the time (to make sure their apps sync automatically, so they can fap to the most accurate number of steps they've taken, or calories they've burned, or whatever), did Akechi ever have his turned on?

Triple nope!

So, she'd had to resort to installing her spyware in person, like some pleb.

Once she finally had his phone in her physical hands, she'd noticed that, other than the standard social media stuff, he only had two third party apps installed: the Meta-nav and some fitness thing that confirmed that he must have, at least, synced his watch with his phone occasionally. (Just, y'know, not when it would have been useful to Futaba!) There had also been a small square of opaque black tape over the forward-facing camera, and even though his paranoia was the reason she'd had such a hard time doing her job in the first place, she still had to respect the effort.

Later on that evening, when they'd all gone home after scoping out Makoto's sister's Palace for the first time, Futaba tracked his phone to a set of apartments in the Honmachi residential district in Shibuya. A quick search of the most recent letting ads for the area had shown mostly studio apartments that were going for between 150,000 and 200,000 yen a month. They might not have known about Akechi's connection to Shido at that stage, but it had already been pretty obvious that he was being bankrolled by someone.

(The post-it note she'd scribbled, 'Oho! Is the Detective Prince secretly involved in compensated dating???' on is probably still trapped down the back of her desk somewhere.)

Futaba's surveillance had only been restricted to Akechi's phone for the time it took for him to get home. Once he was actually in his apartment, the phone automatically connected to his Wi-Fi, along with everything else on the same network, and suddenly, she'd been given access to a treasure trove of devices.

Her first impulse, at the time, had been to take control of the smart ones (the TV, the speaker, and the freaking fridge!), because they would have made for some awesome prank opportunities — if she'd been dealing with one of her friends. This was Akechi, though, and they still hadn't known what his whole deal was at that point, and she did also kind of have a Mainline Quest to take care of. So, ignoring all the fun stuff, Futaba focused on the more strategically important fact that there was also a laptop showing up on the list of available devices.

Not only was it a piece of cake to get into, it also had an unobstructed camera that she could hijack, which meant that it only took a couple of seconds for her to be able to get a proper look into his apartment. From the angle, once the feed connected, she figured that the laptop was on a stand or low table near the window, leaving her with a pretty good view of the vast majority of the room.

And it was just a room, even if it was a swanky one. There were only two doors visible from her vantage point, one of which was definitely the entrance, and by process of elimination, she figured that the second one had to be the bathroom.

The other thing that jumped out at her was that, sure, the apartment was nice — 'good bones' is how Sojiro would probably put it — but it was also a complete mess.

(Well, a complete mess by normie standards anyways. It wasn't anywhere near as bad as her room had been, back when she was still in full shut-in mode.)

For starters, the corner of the living area that was taken up by a small (but expensively modern-looking) kitchen seemed like it must have gone mostly unused. Or, at least, she couldn't imagine that he got any cooking done when most of the counter space, and even the stovetop, were covered with piles upon piles of school books, papers and even a couple of convenience store bags that were haphazardly filled with garbage. One of the bags had a tower of empty instant noodle pots peeking out the top of it, so tall, and stacked with so much skill, that Futaba couldn't help but be a little impressed.

The kitchen nook was separated from his 'bedroom' by a makeshift divider — a long chest of drawers — and his bed (western-style, single, and unmade) was pushed up against the far wall. It seemed like a real waste of the limited space when he could have just used a futon instead, but maybe it had come with the apartment or something? Or maybe he just wanted the extra 'storage', because there were even more books, and some unwashed laundry, lurking underneath the bed.

Finding out that the Detective Prince was just another grubby teenager under all that sparkle was kind of funny, and exactly the sort of thing that she was sure would have made his legions of fangirls go absolutely apeshit.

Then, when it came to actual décor, saying that it was slim pickings would be generous. The walls that she could see from the laptop's little camera were blank, barring the large (at least 55 inches! She'd been super jealous), wafer-thin TV that was just visible at the edge of her feed.

No posters. No paintings. Not even the bland motel-level junk that usually comes with rental properties.

The only personal touch in the whole place was a really nice model ray-gun (vintage Featherman, for sure), mounted on a stand in a fancy little display case, sitting smack-bang in the middle of the kotatsu that was in the centre of the living area. She'd seen him use a similar gun in the Metaverse, along with a literal laser sword, so yeah, there was no way that he wasn't a closet geek.

That first night, just after arriving home, Akechi was sitting at that kotatsu, scrolling through his phone instead of looking at the textbook that was open in front of him. Futaba knew, from where she still had his screen mirrored on one of her other monitors, that he was searching for mentions of himself on social media. Which was super lame, but she figured it was also probably pretty normal for someone who was kind of, sort of famous.

And so, Operation: Sketchy-Akechi had commenced!

Each day had the same basic routine: he got up at 5:30 every morning (even on Sundays!) and went cycling for an hour, then came home, showered, ironed his clothes for the day and went to school, or to the police station, or the prosecutor's office. Then, in the evening, it was cram school or the TV studio in Akasaka Mitsuke.

He came home most nights with a sad-looking convenience store bento and even more paperwork to add to the pile. Ending up working on school assignments or casework until it was super late. That was when he wasn't rushing over to Kichijoji to spend time with their Fearless Leader.

Honestly, his schedule was so scarily full that even just watching him juggle everything made Futaba feel exhausted.

And on top of everything else, no matter how busy he was, or how late he stayed up, he always seemed to find time for his crazily complicated skincare routine. A total time-suck, as far as Futaba's concerned (surely it would be better to watch a show, or play a game, or just stare at the freaking wall), but she has a feeling that some of her friends (Ann especially) would probably disagree.

More than once, he went to the underground in Shibuya and disappeared off her radar entirely, presumably to enter Mementos. They already knew that he was lying about when he got his powers (courtesy of Pancake-gate 2016), so it wasn't surprising. Or even concerning. Why would it have been, when they'd still thought he was this straight-laced amateur detective who was just playing his cards close to his chest? She figured he was just grinding, or something, so he wouldn't look like such a noob when they went back to the casino.

They'd seen his mask after all, and it was red. There was no way they could have guessed he was carrying out hits for Shido.

Womp womp. Hindsight, right?

That one little assumption had left them with a nasty blind spot, but with the information they had at the time, she feels like they still did pretty well.

Luck was on their side with the laptop, at least, because he was the kind of person who had a stupid amount of stuff open at once and just left his machine on all the time, rather than saving and closing everything. Changing the power settings so that the screen just went to sleep when he wasn't active, rather than the laptop going into standby, was easy, and it left Futaba with an uninterrupted video feed when he was home.

She had skimmed over what was actually on the laptop, of course, but hadn't found anything relevant to their situation. Just school assignments, police files, and one very interesting archive: a rip of a bunch of the early seasons of Phoenix Ranger Featherman R. Some of the really mega-obscure stuff from the 90s too! It sucked, because she'd really wanted to talk to him about it — none of her friends are as into Featherman as she is — but it wasn't like she could bring it up with him when she only knew about it because of her snooping.

But hey, at least said snooping had never really been boring! Sprinkled throughout his busy routine there had been lots of other weird, cringy, or just plain freaky stuff too. Like the times when he watched his own interviews on TV and literally took notes, creepily repeating some of the audio over and over again, with slightly different inflections or expressions while he did it. He even sat and just practised his smile or his laugh in a little hand mirror sometimes, which — again, maybe that was a normal thing for a sort-of idol to do, but to Futaba, he'd just looked like a robot or an alien that was trying to perfect its human-disguise.

Futaba recorded all of it (because, duh, of course she did), and added it to the little 'just in case' folder that she'd been compiling. Hoping to have something to use as counter-blackmail if he ever tried to seriously do anything with those pictures of them entering the Metaverse. The folder was mostly full of that kind of harmless, unflattering stuff that she thought would just bruise his big ol' ego. She remembers having a picture of him using the laptop and inelegantly picking his teeth, and another super funny one where he had his hair tied up, his bangs pinned back, and this gloopy, green mask slathered all over his face.

She'd only gotten to the really juicy stuff a couple of nights in.

It had started out innocently enough, with Akechi in bed, hiding under the covers and scrolling endlessly through boring food blogs. So boring, in fact, that she'd only been half paying attention to his screen, and even started working away on some of her own stuff. Half an hour had passed, maybe, before she caught a lot of movement from the corner of her eye and turned back to check on him.

She remembers nearly falling out of her chair entirely, jumpscared by this grainy amateur video of some dude getting absolutely railed by another guy in a public bathroom.

After picking her jaw up off the floor, she'd tapped the shortcut for the program she used to record video and take screenshots without a second thought, squirrelling that new bit of ammunition away with all the rest. There was no way that she wasn't gonna save the evidence that the squeaky-clean Detective Prince was actually a closet case. It was the kind of thing that would probably have been a total career-killer for him. His target demographic skewed conservative, even on the younger end, and Futaba knew that even his most rabid fangirls would probably want him flayed in the street for ruining their self-insert fantasies.

It sucks, but she knows that people are assholes when you try to exist outside whatever crappy box they've decided to put you in.

You couldn't ask for better blackmail material.

Accidentally getting an eyeful of some relatively tame porn hadn't really fazed her (nobody can go as deep into the internet as Futaba has without seeing some serious shit), or at least, she was fine as long as she didn't think too closely about what Akechi was doing while he was watching it anyways. Porn was one thing, but it was just different, and way more embarrassing, when you actually knew the person involved. So she just turned back to her code and resolved to give him some privacy for fifteen-ish minutes.

If she puts on her retrospectacles, she knows that she really should have remembered to mute the feed from the laptop, but she'd been distracted. Mostly by how she was actually starting to feel kind of bad for thinking about using something so private against him, even though he was the one who'd blackmailed them in the first place. But yeah, she didn't realise she'd made a colossal mistake until after she'd heard him moan right in her ear and nearly had a freaking heart attack.

Probably scarred for life, she'd ripped her headphones off, threw them onto her bed, and then spent way too long rummaging through her manga collection to try and find something so shoujo and sparkly that it would bleach her brain clean.

The next day, they'd all gone into Mementos together as a group, and Futaba had been constantly caught somewhere between bluescreening and hysterical laughter every time she had to talk to him. And it only got worse when they stopped at a rest area to chug some coffee and go over their remaining requests. Akechi had sat down heavily on one of the plastic seats and made this stupid sound that had her feeling like she was going to die from secondhand embarrassment. Nobody commented on how she was acting if they noticed, at least. Her friends probably just assumed that she was just being awkward around the New Guy who also happened to be blackmailing them.

They couldn't have known that she was actually freaking out because she'd accidentally overheard what he sounded like when he was jerking it.

It had struck her as funny, though, afterwards, just how different the exchanges between Akechi and Ren seemed once she knew that he was into guys. Both when they were fighting together and spending time with each other outside of the Metaverse. Futaba noticed it more and more as she continued her surveillance, and she tried not to think too hard about the surprisingly genuine smile on his face whenever Ren called him or replied to one of his texts.

Because, well, she had very quickly found out that Goro Akechi was hiding a lot more than his suddenly obvious crush on Ren, being a secret geek, or even when exactly he'd gained access to the Metaverse.

The first clue that there was something more serious going on was that he'd get these weird texts sometimes. Always from dummy phone numbers and clearly written in code.

(Code that took weeks of running through a cipher algorithm before she could actually crack it, and by then it was way too late for any of the people listed in those messages.)

The texts would have been suspicious enough on their own, but there were also the phone calls. She knows now, of course, that Akechi was talking to Shido, but at the time, all she knew was that the guy on the other end of the line sounded shady AF, like there were fifty layers of hidden meaning under everything he said. He was very good at talking for forever without really saying anything at all, or at least, not saying anything incriminating, or useful.

She should have known he was a skeezball politician.

One evening, she was listening in on another one of those calls, and Futaba had been expecting it to be as pointless as usual, but Shifty Dude was obviously getting impatient about something, and he always sounded like the kind of guy who doesn't deal well with being made to wait. She remembers flinching as he barked down the phone about results, and deadlines, and expectations, all with a poorly concealed threat hidden underneath.

Akechi, though — he hadn't even seemed ruffled — just fobbed the angry tirade off with some bland affirmatives, like he could just reflect all that damage. Futaba couldn't help but be impressed. Especially when she'd spent the entire call quaking in her seat, despite being very far away and safe behind her computer screen.

The way he was speaking to Akechi just reminded her way too much of her shitty uncle.

After the call ended, Futaba watched Akechi throw his phone onto his bed (so hard that it bounced twice and then nearly went splat on the floor) and stalk angrily into the kitchen. Fumbling through one of the cupboards with hands so shaky that she didn't even need to squint to see it, it was clear that he wasn't anywhere near as unaffected as he'd seemed only moments before. Again, she'd sympathised.

Glass in hand, he'd turned towards the sink, but he was still trembling so violently that it slipped out of his grip, and, with a loud crash, it fell to the floor and broke into a million pointy little pieces.

The sound of it, even muffled through the laptop feed, nearly made Futaba jump out of her skin.

Akechi, though, he didn't react.

Not immediately, anyway.

Creepily, he just stared down at the mess on the floor for a few seconds, before he'd slowly — calmly — reached down to pick up one of the really big shards. She'd watched, wide-eyed, as he made a fist around it and squeezed, his expression staying terrifyingly blank the entire time, all while big, fat drops of blood slipped between his fingers and down onto the floor.

Horrified, she'd scrambled to try and think of something, anything, she could do to interrupt him without blowing her cover, and before he could cut his stupid fingers off. In the end, she'd taken control of his phone, turned the ringer volume all the way up, and sent him a hastily thrown together, fake marketing text that she hoped he wouldn't look too closely at.

His message tone had been loud and jarring in the quiet apartment, and it made Futaba jump again, even though she was expecting it. Thankfully, and more importantly, it also snapped Akechi out of whatever weird, meatspace status effect he'd been afflicted with. He dropped the sharp piece of glass with a hiss and a pained flick of his wrist that sent a spray of blood across the floor.

Futaba probably would have fainted if she hadn't also been so seriously keyed up.

He'd spent a few minutes at the kitchen sink afterwards, running his hand under the tap, and when he was done, she watched him hold it up to the light. Examining it with this hard, almost clinical look on his face that made Futaba think that it probably wasn't the first time something like that had happened. (Which was just mega-depressing, really.) Eventually, he wrapped a couple of paper towels around his hand and headed for the bathroom, and she watched the door click shut behind him with dismay — trying not to freak out too much, because she had no idea what to do. Her experience with self-harm might have been of the more passive variety (shutting herself away, not eating enough or consistently, and not bathing for days or sometimes weeks at a time), but she knew that he needed help.

She just couldn't think of a way to get it to him that wouldn't also jeopardise everything they'd worked for.

When he came back into view again, his left hand was lightly bandaged but seemed otherwise okay — or at least, he wasn't holding it weirdly or anything when he picked his phone back up — and she'd been relieved that he probably hadn't done himself any serious damage. It was another one of those things that, looking back on it months later, was kind of funny. Maybe if he'd really messed up his dominant hand, it would've interfered with his part-time assassin gig and saved them all a buttload of trouble.

The mirrored phone display had shown him dismiss her text without reading it, and then he typed a number in from memory and pressed the 'call' button.

"Akechi." It was The Shady Douchebag, and he sounded pissed. The number was different from the one they usually used, and Futaba figured that the call must have been to a burner phone. "You'd better have a good reason for disturbing me again."

"My apologies, sir," Akechi had replied, and his voice was impressively steady, considering how shaken he had been earlier. "I was reflecting on our conversation regarding the upcoming deadline, and I think I have a solution that will wrap things up nicely for all parties involved."

"This line is secure, boy. You don't need to beat around the bush."

Futaba can still remember how she'd rolled her eyes and laughed at the idea of any line being secure, before tapping the key to record the audio absent-mindedly just as Akechi started talking again.

And it was a good thing too, because he'd gone on to outline a detailed plan to capture them, or at least Ren, in Makoto's sister's Palace — even bringing an army of police mooks into the Metaverse to do it. It was overkill, and über shitty, but it was also pretty much what they'd already assumed was their worst-case scenario with Akechi; that he was still going to try to have them arrested, despite the deal he'd made with them.

Disappointing, but not really a surprise (narcs gonna narc), you know? Nah, the thing that really caught her off guard was the bit that came next.

"Let me see..." Akechi had paused for dramatic effect, tapping his chin with one finger in the way she'd seen him practice in front of the mirror. "We could say he stole the guard's gun while he was in custody... How about that?"

The room around Futaba had suddenly seemed very small, claustrophobic and hot, despite the November chill — like a tomb all over again, and she'd been unable to focus on the rest of what he was saying. It was like her brain was just throwing error after error, because, against all odds, she had actually kind of started to like Akechi while she'd been keeping an eye on him, even found herself rooting for him and his goofy flirting with Ren! She couldn't wrap her head around him talking about murdering her friend, her friend that had basically become her brother, like he was arranging a business lunch.

When the conversation finally ended and Akechi hung up the phone, she'd been grateful that everything had been recorded, since she hadn't been able to parse half of what he said. Her heart had been pounding too loudly in her ears.

By then, it had already been late by Ren's (or Mona's) standards, and he didn't answer when she tried to call his phone. Stuck, and unsure of what she was supposed to do without Ren's input, she'd just gone back to watching the monitor and trying (not super successfully) to not have a panic attack.

Akechi got ready for bed pretty much immediately afterwards, and Futaba remembers being irrationally annoyed on top of everything else when he didn't seem to have any trouble drifting off.

For her at least, it had been an awful night.

At that point, she'd already been awake for the guts of twenty-four hours and was way too amped to even think about going to bed herself. She ended up spending her time listening to the recording over and over again instead, trying her best to come up with some way out of the mess that they were suddenly neck-deep in.

In the morning, Sojiro had been (understandably) surprised when she came downstairs, just a little after six, to walk with him to Leblanc. He hadn't pushed for an explanation once she said that she needed to talk to Ren about some important Phantom Thief Business. Just patted her head and told her he hoped they were being careful, in that gruffly concerned way of his.

Futaba had felt terrible for keeping him in the dark. Again.

And it had only gotten worse from there, sitting up in the café's attic with Mona and Ren while she tried to explain what she overheard, stuttering and stumbling over her words in a way that she hadn't done around either of them in months. Ren had still seemed half-asleep until she actually started playing the recording, going from dazed to looking like he'd chowed down on a handful of Dr Takemi's Alert Capsules, as her phone filled the quiet morning air with the casual discussion of his assassination.

Ren is usually hard to read, but she remembers how shocked — how hurt — he'd looked, just before he hid it all by shifting into Leader Mode. They suddenly had a murder plot to foil after all, and it was easy to get swept up in the planning. Especially once they looped Makoto in, and their scheme really started to take shape.

Pretending that everything was fine when they had to be around Akechi — in Mementos, and in the last couple of runs through the casino — was tricky, but they pulled it off, somehow.

And eventually, they were ready to send the calling card. A full week before the deadline that Akechi had given them. Futaba has already forgotten whatever his baloney excuse had been for that (and she doesn't forget much); she'd been too focused on the fact it was actually a countdown until he tried to kill Ren.

With the Palace pretty much done, and their plan coming along nicely, that week should have been pretty stress-free, right?

Wrong, apparently, because Ren had other ideas.

Sure, he talked a big game in front of the others, promising them he'd be careful, and, knowing Ren, he'd probably even managed to convince himself that he was. Futaba, though, she had access to his GPS data — and Akechi's — and she knew that they spent almost every single evening together in the run-up to the 19th. Hanging out in the jazz club and Penguin Sniper like everything was totally normal.

They even went into Mementos together! Which was scary enough, but Futaba found out later that Mona let them go in there alone! Without any backup!

Seriously, she'd nearly pinched the fuzzy little cheeks right off his face for being such a dumbbutt.

Ren gets-off-on-danger Amamiya notwithstanding, her surveillance that week had continued on as normal, pretty much. The only real difference was how all of those extra outings kept Akechi away from his apartment until even later than usual, and that meant she didn't have to look at his stupid face on her feed as much. Which was nice.

There weren't any more phone calls to worry about, either. Not until the 20th, and that was after they'd already pulled the trigger (haha) on their switcheroo scheme.

And not only did their plan go off without a hitch, they must have all combined their luck stats, or something, because when Akechi called in to report his 'success' he got sloppy. Dropping Shido's name about two seconds into the phone call.

Futaba had been riding high (Ren was safe and back in Leblanc, and they had the Big Bad's name to boot!), when she saw Akechi finally open the door to his apartment that evening. She remembers flipping him off with both hands and yelling something like, 'Suck it, loser!' at the screen.

But then, pretty much immediately, he made this angry, growly sound through his teeth, and she'd been terrified for an irrational second that he'd somehow heard her, even yelping out loud when he suddenly threw his douchey, monogrammed briefcase across the room a few seconds later.

It had spun in the air and bounced off a wall, popping open and sending papers, pens, and a couple of manila folders flying everywhere.

And that was only the start of it.

Mouth agape, she sat in stunned silence as he had a full-on nuclear meltdown, snarling and swearing as he swept all the books and garbage off the kitchen counters. He even grabbed and punted a day-old takeout carton into the air with one of his polished shoes, so hard that it exploded messily against the ceiling. Futaba watched the rain of leftover fried rice and vegetables fall down around him in what felt like slow motion, the spell only broken when he reached out and nearly yanked the nearest cupboard door off its freaking hinges. All so that he could start pulling glasses and dishes out at random to smash on the floor and against the wall.

She still doesn't understand how no one called the police; either his neighbours were out or they were deaf.

(Although, now that she thinks about it, with the benefit of hindsight, and knowing just how deep Shido's conspiracy actually went… there was probably a good chance that any neighbours Akechi had were actually spies. If they were tattling to anyone about Akechi's freakout, it wasn't the police — or not the kind of police that would have done anything about it anyways…)

It might have felt like a million years, but his tantrum probably only lasted all of five minutes, before the kitchen was totally wrecked, and he was just left standing there in the middle of it, chest heaving and face flushed and sweaty. She remembers wondering if he was just catching his breath before getting stuck right into trashing the rest of the place, when he'd just sort of crumpled instead, leaning back against the double doors of his fridge and slipping down to the floor. Shaky hands came up to cover his face, and then he just started screaming into them. Over and over again. Until he was so hoarse, the broken noise coming through Futaba's headphones sounded more like sobbing than anything else.

Watching him completely flip his shit had left Futaba feeling a weird mixture of satisfaction and pity that she hadn't known what to do with. She wanted to be mad at him, yeah, but it was also just sad, really, seeing him like that. Especially when she thought back on it later, after he'd spilled his guts to them in the engine room, or when they finally went up against Shido for real, and they heard all the awful shit he thought about Akechi—

"...Futaba?"

There's something soft tickling her nose and batting at her cheek.

"Oi, Futaba!" Mona's scratchy, not-quite-whisper comes from somewhere very close to her ear. "Futaba, wake up!"

She opens her eyes, and blinks up at the cat looming over her.

Ugh, why didn't she close her window before trying to settle down for the night?

"Mooooonaaaa," she groans, covering her face with her hands. "I'm trying to sleep."

Not that it had been going very well, but he doesn't need to know that.

"Akechi is in Leblanc!"

What.

Futaba feels a little like her internal OS gets stuck in a boot-loop for a couple of seconds, before she remembers how to do basic things, like thinking, or stringing a sentence together.

"What?!" she almost yells before catching herself, remembering that Sojiro is asleep down the hall. "How?! He's supposed to be dead! Again! Re-dead!"

Has she become some kind of necromancer without realising it? Did she think Akechi back into existence somehow, and now he's going to haunt Leblanc as some weird revenge for her remembering all of his embarrassing crap?

"Ren said something about the Velvet Room..." Mona starts, his tail lashing back and forth in the universal language of unhappy kitties everywhere. "It doesn't matter! What's important is that he's there now. Ren asked me to let them talk — alone — but I heard something... it sounded like an argument and then... a scuffle? Maybe. I'm not sure, but I didn't want to try to help only for it to just end up like that time with Haru's ex-fiancé..."

Akechi is a dick, but that still seems like an unfair comparison.

"And what do you expect me to do, Mona?" she whispers back, starting to feel exasperated as she reaches out to grab her glasses and her headphones off the desk. "Yeah, one sec, let me just send Sojiro over to Leblanc to break up a fight between two guys who are less than half his age, and also, one of them used to be a supernatural hitman! Seems like a great—"

The words die in her mouth, because she's got her headphones on now, and her system is always tuned into the café's feed by default — and yeah, Akechi is in Leblanc, and he's definitely not dead.

She wishes she could say the same thing about her brain.

"What's wrong?" Morgana asks. He sounds very far away. "Is Ren okay?"

Ren is very okay, if what she's hearing is any indication. It sounds like they're nearly on top of one of her bugs. Yikes. She hits mute and pushes away from the desk with a slightly hysterical giggle.

Mona jumps down onto her legs before she can pull them up to her chest, definitely using more claw than is really necessary. Ouch.

"Futaba, talk to me. What's happening over there?"

"They're not fighting, Mona." She tries to say it with as much implication in her tone as possible, throwing in an exaggerated wink for good measure — telepathically pleading with him to just get it without her having to explain.

He just looks confused. Oh God, she's really going to have to give The Talk to their cat, isn't she?

She clears her throat awkwardly. "Uh, when two rivals love each other very much—"

Morgana interrupts her with a weird, strangled noise that makes it sound like he's going to hack up a hairball right there on her lap.

"They're not...!" he splutters — she can almost see him adding it up in his head, like the Confused Math Lady meme. "There's no way! Ren would have told me..."

Welp, she tried.

Futaba's always found it easier to show rather than tell anyways.

Shrugging, she pushes Morgana off her lap. He jumps up onto the desk and sits down beside her keyboard, his tail still flicking from side to side in agitation. Switching her speakers on, she makes sure the dial is only just above its lowest setting before letting her finger hover over the mute key.

"Last chance to back out, Mona."

"I think you're messing with me, and they're just talking." He narrows his eyes suspiciously at her. "Probably..."

"Famous last words," she says solemnly. Sending Ren a quick mental apology, she turns the audio on.

At first, there's just some rustling over the feed, and Morgana is already starting to look smug, but then Ren's voice comes out of the speaker, clear and husky.

"Do you really think you can be quiet?"

And, Oh My God, she could have died happily without ever having heard Ren repurposing his Joker Voice for Sex Things, but it's worth it for the way that Mona looks like he's about to have a stroke!

Frozen in place, he honestly looks more like a stuffed animal than a real cat. Unable to resist, she reaches out to poke him, and that gets him moving again — swiping at her finger angrily. She hardly feels the scratch, though, because that's when they hear Akechi moan like a character right out of one of her H-games.

Morgana jumps up like someone pulled his tail, mashing her keyboard with his paws frantically but fruitlessly. He is in the general area of where the mute key is, but somehow he manages to miss it every single time.

Someone touching anything on her desk is usually more than enough to send her into Rage Mode, but she's laughing too hard right now to care, and trying even harder not to make any noise. By the time Mona does actually succeed in turning the audio off, her ribs and the muscles in her abdomen hurt so much, and she's literally gasping for air.

"I tried to warn you!" she wheezes, pushing her glasses up and out of the way to rub the tears out of her eyes.

"You're really mean sometimes, Futaba, you know that?" he huffs, jumping up to his favourite spot on top of her computer tower and curling up into a grouchy ball.

"Yeah, yeah," she replies, still trying to catch her breath, as she waves a dismissive hand at him.

Things are very awkward and very quiet after that, while she turns her speakers back off, and fixes the handful of windows that opened while Mona was keyboard mashing.

"I know that some people are weird about... that kind of stuff," Morgana says, eventually. He's wearing his Super Serious Face. "When it's two boys or two girls, I mean — but I wasn't being like that, even though I was surprised. Just, uh, just so you know."

Oh, this is kind of cute. He's lucky that he's out of cheek-squishing range.

She has a pretty good idea of what his problem really was anyway. "It's because it's Akechi, right?"

"Yeah, it is." He sounds relieved. "Although I guess it's actually kind of obvious when you stop to think about it, huh?"

She's been literally watching them dance around their feelings for each other (through murder plots and timeline shenanigans) for months, so she just hums in agreement.

They fall into a much more comfortable silence this time, and it isn't long before Morgana is snoring softly up on his perch. There's no universe in which she'd actually be able to go to sleep now, though, so she bends down to peer into her mini-fridge instead. No Mad Bull left, unfortunately, but there are a couple of cans of Dr Salt NEO, which should be enough caffeine to keep her going…

Or make her heart explode.

Either-or.

Opening a can and taking a swig, she tries to think of something to do, since she's not going to be sleeping n'all… Oh! She was going to ask Ren to approach Sumire about her borked phone, right? Now's as good a time as any to set up that isolated environment.

Rooting out an old laptop, she starts setting it up, getting so lost in the familiar process that she's not sure how much time passes before there's a flicker from the monitor to her left. She looks up and sees that Ren has just plugged his phone in to charge, and seizing the opportunity to make contact, she starts typing without really thinking about it.

-Ren Amamiya-
19/03/2017
4:27 a.m.

Futaba: Mona is here with me if ur looking for him…

It's only a few seconds before she can see that he's read it at least, so she continues typing.

Futaba: tell Akechi congrats on the respawn I guess
┐(￣ヘ￣;)┌

She half-writes a couple of messages that poke fun at the fact that she overheard way more than she ever wanted to, but none of them feel right, and she has to start over. Then she thinks of something that gets the point across while also throwing some good-natured shade at Akechi. Perfect.

Futaba: if playing visual novels has taught me anything its that going the yandere route usually gets you the Bad End
〣( ºΔº )〣
Futaba: just be careful ok?

Ren: 👍

She puts her head in her hands and starts snickering to herself again. She's used to him being mostly silent in the group chat (and in-person), so she really shouldn't have expected that this would be any different.

Sitting up, Futaba looks back down at the laptop she's going to use to fix Sumire's disaster of a phone — it's time to get back to work.

She tries not to get too distracted by thoughts of a bouncy red ponytail that always smells like strawberry shampoo, or being called 'senpai' in a cute, chirpy voice.

Chapter Text

Goro feels like he's been flayed alive. Completely stripped bare and exposed in a way that dangerously straddles the line between unbearable and liberating. It's as if his skin has been peeled away, lovingly — his ribs pried outwards by firm, gentle hands — until everything inside could be scooped out to make a cosy little hollow for the boy sleeping in his arms.

He knows he's being stupid and dramatic, of course. His brain is currently swimming in an unfamiliar and potent cocktail of endorphins, oxytocin, and dopamine (courtesy of one incredibly intense orgasm, a mortifying amount of crying and the most physical contact he's had in half a decade), and that's why he feels like a stranger in his own skin. Simultaneously ill at ease and the most content he's ever felt in his life.

Ren's words are still clear in his mind — sweet and so fucking sure of himself, saying that Goro is 'allowed to be happy'. As if wanting your would-be murderer to be happy is the most natural thing in the world and not complete and utter lunacy. And that's not even the main issue he has with what Ren said, because the thing about his relationship with that particular emotion is that he's not entirely sure that he's capable of it; not in any sustained or healthy way, at least. For years, the closest he's ever come to actually achieving happiness has always been through indulging in its sharper and less savoury cousins.

The satisfaction that comes with besting another, for example, or the vindictive, petty glee he'd experience in the wake of someone else's failure.

Feelings that only ever come at the expense of others.

Is it any wonder that Goro doesn't know what to do with himself or this soft, frighteningly delicate thing that's decided to make its home behind his breastbone? He feels clumsy and dangerous with it, like a cat trying to carry a fledgling bird in its sharp maw without crushing the life out of it.

There has to have been a mix-up, really. Even if he hadn't tried to kill Ren, he still knows that people like him aren't made to be content — that he's always been far too much like his mother in that regard. He certainly hasn't earned the right to be lying in bed next to humanity's champion and saviour, particularly when he's well aware of the fact that Ren could have his pick of any one of his insufferably virtuous, and infinitely more appropriate, friends instead.

Goro's not stupid or blind, he's seen the way the female Thieves and Kitagawa look at Ren — all wistful longing and doe-eyed adoration — and he's sure that even Sakamoto would happily drop to his knees if his 'bro' were to ask him to do so.

Pushing aside the ugly, covetous feeling that squirms in his chest at the thought, he takes a moment to appreciate just how quickly his own subconscious jumped at the chance to sabotage his relatively good mood — trying to twist it into something unpleasant and distinctly green-eyed.

And really, he shouldn't have to be thinking about all of this shit right now.

Why isn't he asleep yet?

His eyes may be sore, and his nose (which, thankfully, hadn't run while he'd been sobbing all over Ren like some kind of simpleton) is uncomfortably plugged up, but he can still feel the exhaustion in his blood. In the marrow of his bones. All the way down to the very fabric of his wretched being.

Someone seems to have forgotten to actually relay that information to his brain, unfortunately.

There's a good chance that being stuck in the Velvet Room for months on end might count as some sort of supernatural hibernation, he supposes. That his body doesn't technically need to sleep right now. Caught, perhaps, in some strange limbo between being worn-out and well-rested.

It could also be because he is completely wired on top of the exhaustion, and still in absolute disbelief about what happened with Ren downstairs. Honestly, he thinks he'd be less surprised if everything since the thirteenth of December turned out to be a vivid fever dream cooked up by his dying brain, while he actually bleeds out for real, all alone in his father's shitty Palace.

Which is just more self-flagellating bullshit that he's going to pretend never occurred to him in the first place.

Even if he knows that it's far more than he deserves.

For fuck's sake! Stop it!

He'd slap himself if he wasn't so sure that it would disturb Ren, so he just exhales (with some difficulty) through his stuffy nose, opens his eyes, and resigns himself to the fact that he's not going to be able to get to sleep any time soon.

Slowly, carefully, he extracts himself from the mess of gangly limbs he's thoroughly tangled in (going deathly still the one time that Ren stirs, and only resuming his movements once he's settled again), and hoists himself, gently, up into a sitting position. He shimmies backwards until he can rest his back against the wall at the head of the bed.

Ren left the lamp on his desk lit earlier, and Goro would like to lay the blame for his inability to sleep at its feet, but it's not especially bright as lamps go, and the attic is large — the weak glow of the bulb barely reaches the far wall. And, truthfully, it isn't really any worse than the light pollution that he's used to anyway, bleeding through the blinds in his apartment.

It does still illuminate things enough for Goro to indulge himself in a little staring while Ren is unaware, however. Something he knows is probably considered strange and maybe even a little crass. Certainly, it must fall under the umbrella of the stalking behaviour that Ren had rudely (and correctly) accused him of earlier.

Although… now that their relationship has progressed, perhaps it's actually considered... romantic?

Goro grimaces and rubs at his face roughly with the back of his hand. Just the thought of something so sappy leaves him with an unpleasant, queasy feeling low in his gut, at the same time that it makes his heart flutter in his chest.

Pathetic.

His eyes linger, though, regardless. Greedily drinking in the way Ren's sleep-softened features look almost ludicrously cherubic in the dim light. With his lips slightly parted, and those long, dark eyelashes fanned flatteringly against pale, flawless skin.

Then Ren makes a decidedly un-angelic snuffling noise in his sleep, and turns over so that he's facing the wall, as if he's somehow aware of the fact that he has an audience. Goro has to stifle a fond chuckle with the back of his hand.

Deprived of the distraction that is Ren's obnoxiously pretty face, he casts his eyes around the attic and realises that he's never really had the opportunity to just look around Ren's room. Any time he'd been here previously was for the Phantom Thief meetings in November, and the atmosphere then had been far too tense for him to really pay close attention to anything other than maintaining his cover. That, and awkwardly inserting himself into Ren's personal space whenever the opportunity presented itself, of course. He can still remember standing behind Ren with one hand gripping the back of his chair possessively, and how he'd actually managed to rationalise that away to himself as an 'intimidation tactic'.

Yes, the less he thinks about that, the better.

Putting aside his embarrassingly deluded past behaviour for the moment, he gets back to scoping out the attic; it really is the complete opposite of his own living space in almost every way. His apartment is like a shiny and expensive bauble, a carrot at the end of a stick, 'gifted' to him by Shido at the very beginning of their partnership. A symbol of power and freedom for him at first, but like everything he'd received while working with his degenerate father, it lost its lustre very quickly.

Ren's attic room, on the other hand, is filled to the brim with that nebulous something that makes a place feel like an actual 'home' — despite the fact that Goro would be extremely surprised if it actually qualified as anywhere near habitable by any official standard. Some people might be shocked to find the living conditions of a minor so far below code, or that it hadn't, at the very least, been flagged by the social workers that were overseeing Ren's probation, but Goro's not surprised. Rather, he's all too familiar with just how much the 'system' is willing to let slide, either out of apathy or just sheer, simple incompetence.

But as far as he's concerned, Ren is lucky; he's never seen Sojiro Sakura be anything other than kind, to Ren, or to the ragtag band of metaphysical thieves he drags through here daily. Even if the man's idea of suitable housing for his charge does leave something to be desired.

His eyes skim over the shelves beside him; there's a surprisingly large model swan boat there and, tucked in behind it, he can see Ren's toiletries in a plastic caddy. There's some cheap-looking body wash, a 2-in-1 shampoo and conditioner, a large bottle of mouthwash and a plastic cup (the surface of which is decorated with cutesy cartoon cats, because of course it is) that's holding a tube of toothpaste and a bright red toothbrush. He notes the box of tissues and the large pump bottle of lotion beside the caddy with raised eyebrows. Though perhaps he needs to get his mind out of the gutter. He can't fathom how Ren could actually find the privacy to make use of them for anything interesting when he constantly has a talking cat glued to his side.

A little further in on the shelf, he can just see his own neatly folded stack of clothes, nestled between some more of Ren's tacky souvenirs — and when it comes to souvenirs, he's willing to bet that there's one here representing every single tourist trap in the city. It's not surprising; back when he was laying the groundwork for framing the Phantom Thieves, he'd tailed Ren, a lot, and that meant he had a front-row seat to more than one of the many excursions that Ren went on with his impressively (and frustratingly) large roster of friends and acquaintances. But even so, seeing the evidence of all the relationships that Ren has cultivated in the short time he's been in Tokyo, in one place like this… it just makes that jealous thing tug at his heart again.

Truthfully, he's not even sure if he's more envious of the people that Ren spends his time with, or if he's just being resentful about how easy it was for Ren to have made so many friends in the first place.

Which is just pathetic of him, really, but at least it's on brand.

Because he doesn't think he'll ever be able to stop feeling bitter about how effortless Ren makes it look, how he just draws people to him with the kind of natural charisma and effortless charm that Goro could never hope to have. Not without hiding who he really is behind fifty layers of bullshit, anyway.

He's pulled out of what feels like his hundredth downward spiral of the night, when a hideously green t-shirt over by the desk catches his eye, and he makes a quiet amused noise through his nose when he sees the 'I ♥️ Tokyo' emblazoned across the front of it. It's almost too cliché, isn't it? Ren might not give it away with his deceptively neutral accent, but Goro knows, from his file, that he's from some no-name, fishing town in the countryside, and that t-shirt (even more so than all the other souvenirs) makes him seem like just one more face in the endless sea of Tokyo's dazzled tourists.

Even though he knows that Ren is the furthest thing from average or ordinary in any context.

As Goro realises that he's apparently seen all there is to see when it comes to the various keepsakes scattered about the attic, there's something — or rather the absence of something — that's beginning to stand out to him.

Not a single one of them appears to commemorate any of the time that he and Ren spent together.

Strange.

Considering just how many outings (he hadn't called them 'dates' at the time, and he's not going to start now) they'd gone on together, it's not exactly something that could be blamed on lack of opportunity. Granted, establishments like Jazz Jin and Penguin Sniper might not have gift shops, but the same couldn't be said about the aquarium, or even the arcade, technically. Certainly, both places had no shortage of souvenirs to take home, if you were so inclined.

Under different circumstances, Goro might actually have found himself feeling offended, but it's difficult to take it personally. Not when he'd essentially caught Ren sleeping with his tie earlier, as if he were a child with a cherished stuffed animal.

And speaking of — he can actually see said tie near the end of the bed, presumably having been pushed down there while they were settling into their… sleeping arrangement. Shifting a little, just enough so that he can stretch his leg out towards the end of the bed, Goro hooks a toe under the tie and carefully pulls it up the mattress until he can catch it with his hand.

The fabric is limp and badly wrinkled, and when he runs his thumb over it, he can even feel a few patches where the material is actually starting to wear thin. It's somewhat… bewildering to think that an object so mundane has become so important to Ren in the handful of months since he'd left it here by mistake.

Goro is not sentimental by nature. He can count the number of items he's ever been emotionally attached to on one hand (and the number of people on two fingers), and it's difficult for him to imagine doing the same thing with some token of Ren's. Even if their positions had been reversed… and they essentially had been, hadn't they? For a couple of weeks, at least. When he'd fully thought that Ren was dead after his spectacular fuck-up on the 20th of November. The only indulgence he'd allowed himself regarding his complicated feelings on that matter had been an all-consuming rage. He knows now, of course, that it was something far closer to grief than simple anger, and a stupid fucking thing to feel when he'd only had himself to blame. At the time, however, it had just been one more thing to fuel the fire he'd set around the pyre with his father's name on it.

It just hadn't seemed necessary to think about it too closely.

What would have been the point? It wasn't as if he had been planning on living after he'd finally dealt with Shido.

His train of thought is derailed when Ren shifts suddenly beside him, flopping over onto his back with all the grace of a fish out of water, and swings his left arm in a wide arc that ends with him dropping it heavily across the top of Goro's thighs. Leaving him having to grit his teeth against the undignified yelp and subsequent hysterical laughter that are nearly surprised out of him.

If Ren is usually this active in his sleep, he has to wonder how Morgana hasn't been smothered or crushed to death yet.

Ah, and isn't that a lovely thought? One can only dream.

Lifting the arm draped across him as delicately as he can, Goro takes Ren's hand in his own. He threads the tie loosely between those long, elegant fingers, and hopes that it will stay relatively secure as he closes them around it. Giving Ren's fist a gentle squeeze, he eases it back down into the space between them.

Clearly caught up in a dream, Goro watches the way Ren's eyes dart back and forth under his eyelids, and how it makes his eyelashes flutter prettily.

But then the small smile that was forming on Goro's face freezes and contorts into something pained. Completely blindsided by the sudden clear image of what those eyelashes look like, wet and clumped together with the blood oozing from an entry wound of Goro's own making. Followed immediately by the all too vivid memory of the meaty thud Ren's head had made when it connected with the cheap metal tabletop in that interrogation room.

His stomach drops like a rock.

Covering his face with shaky hands, he tries to regulate his breathing — something that is rapidly threatening to devolve into hyperventilation — as his mouth floods with saliva, and nausea rolls uncomfortably through him and up into his throat.

Fuck.

No!

Unsurprisingly, this isn't his first time dealing with a panic attack brought on by that particular set of intrusive thoughts. Familiarity doesn't make the experience any more pleasant, but it does help him wrangle the alarm pulsing through him, and, with some effort, he manages to push it down. Compartmentalising as much of it away as he can, enough that his heart stops trying to thump its way through his sternum, even if only just.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Goro can't say exactly how long he sits there, inhaling and exhaling, deep and slow, like he's a parody of some fucking Zen master in an old, shitty kung-fu movie, but it does the job. There is still an uncomfortable lump in his throat afterwards, however, leaving him dangerously unsure about whether he's actually going to vomit. One thing he does know is that sitting here and waiting to find out is not a luxury he can afford (or a risk he's willing to take) when he's not alone, it's not his bed, and the bathroom is so far away.

He has the forethought, at least, to grab the bottle of mouthwash as he gets up and out of the bed. Doing so with all the practised ease and stealth of someone who spent the majority of his formative years sneaking around, trying to avoid disturbing the adults he'd been living with at the time. Even his mother, who had mostly been sweet to him, would quickly turn nasty if he bothered her when she was having one of her bad days.

(Which, unfortunately, had been almost every day near the end.)

The unfinished floorboards of the attic feel unpleasantly rough under his bare feet, and he absent-mindedly hopes that he doesn't get a splinter before he's onto the more polished wood of the stairs and descending into the café.

Goro's nearly at the bottom of the stairs when one of the steps creaks loudly underfoot, and his sick feeling is promptly joined by a reflexive stab of panicky dread. As a child, he'd had to learn the hard way that it was best to creep past the closed doors of some of his particularly unsavoury foster parents. The threat of violence is a potent motivator, and the impulse to make as little noise (or take up as little space) as possible in this context is a habit that he's never really been able to break, even after living alone for nearly three years now.

He waits a few beats, frozen in place and holding his breath (as if he were some petrified prey animal that just heard a twig snap in the undergrowth), until he's reasonably sure that Ren is still asleep, and then hurries down the last couple of stairs and into the restroom.

The café's little bathroom has always been mercifully clean for one that's open to the public. He's never been sure if that's down to any real effort on Sakura or Ren's part, or just a result of Leblanc having an ageing, and not especially large customer base, but it's something that he's immensely grateful for now.

The urge to vomit has mostly subsided, thankfully, but he does actually need to make use of the facilities, so it's not a total waste of a trip at least.

After he's emptied his bladder, he goes to the sink to wash his hands and splash some water on his face, wishing that he had something to keep his hair out of the way properly while he does it. The cold water goes a long way to making him feel better, though. A little more human, and less like a walking bundle of frayed nerves. In the mirror, he's greeted by a face that is trying its best to be red and puffy on top of being sickly pale.

The skin under his eyes looks almost bruised.

Ugh, he'd kill for a cooling gel eye mask right now.

It's fortunate at least that the nausea has eased off. He does not want to think about puking up food that's technically three fucking months old-

His stomach clenches painfully at the thought.

Motherfucker!

Only just making it in time, he drops to his knees on the floor in front of the toilet, stomach muscles seizing as everything comes up — so violently, in fact, that he definitely pulls something between his shoulder blades in the process.

"God fucking damn it…" he hisses weakly, once the retching finally stops. Brushing his hair back out of his face with a trembling hand, he's relieved to find that it doesn't feel like he got any vomit in it.

Small mercies.

Goro waits until he's sure that his insides have stopped trying to kill him before he even tries to move. Standing, he flushes the toilet, and immediately winces at how loud it sounds. Though if Ren hadn't woken up at the sound of him puking his guts up, then he's probably not going to be roused by a little running water. Hopefully.

Making his way back to the sink on slightly wobbly legs, he grabs the bottle of mouthwash. It's one of those big '50% extra free' bottles, and still mostly full, but Goro ends up going through most of it anyway. Gargling mouthful after mouthful until the alcohol in it has his eyes streaming, and the inside of his mouth feels like it's on fire.

Leaving the bathroom, he stops to grab the bottle of water off the bar — the one he left earlier, when he'd been too distracted by Ren to actually drink it. He's parched, but he still doesn't risk more than a couple of tentative sips, very wary of how his treacherous stomach might react. Once he's taken the edge off his thirst, and after a moment's deliberation, he decides to bring it with him as he heads for the stairs. The journey back up is probably slightly closer to silent than the one on the way down had been, given that his body has finished its petty act of rebellion, and now that he's aware of that creaky stair — which he glares at, petulantly and irrationally, as he steps over it.

Ren is still fast asleep, apparently blissfully unaware of the nastiness downstairs, having hardly moved at all since Goro left the bed.

He'd like to keep it that way too, so it's a pleasant surprise when the mattress doesn't dip or sag at all under his weight as he reclaims his earlier place, sitting between Ren and the shelf, with his back against the wall. One point, he supposes, in favour of Ren having a bed with no real frame is that there are no creaky springs underneath them to worry about.

Still feeling like sleep isn't going to come any time soon, he reaches, carefully, over to the windowsill to grab his phone. He's particularly mindful of the charging cable as he does it, keeping it mostly tucked around the edge of the bed, and as much out of Ren's way as possible. Goro doesn't want him to get caught in it if he starts rolling around again.

Thumb hovering over the power button, Goro thinks back to when he'd set his phone to aeroplane mode just after jumping into the Metaverse to pursue the Thieves in his father's Palace in December. It was something that had seemed prudent at the time, since he had been concerned that it might have given his presence away to Futaba Sakura otherwise. He's still not sure if that's how her powers actually work, but regardless, it's how he knows, as he turns the phone on, that he'll have the opportunity to set it to silent and turn off the vibration, before he reconnects to the network and gets flooded with notifications.

And 'flooded' turns out to be an understatement. Scores of messages, voicemails and missed calls pop up on his screen. Far more, in fact, than he remembers there being when he'd checked his phone on Maruki's version of Christmas Eve.

Curious.

It would be very much in character for that simpering fool of a counsellor to think that he was doing him a kindness by cleaning up the notifications a little. Probably even getting rid of some of the particularly unpleasant messages lest they hurt his feelings. Honestly, Goro wouldn't be surprised if he'd also slipped in some completely fabricated niceties while he was at it.

The joke's on Maruki though. Goro hadn't actually looked at any of them at the time, just highlighted everything and marked them all as 'read' without a second thought. Not that he could really say why, looking back on it…

Perhaps he'd simply already realised that something was off, even at that early stage.

Back to the task at hand, he decides to check the list of missed calls first. His school features prominently, as does his homeroom teacher, unsurprisingly — then there's his agent, his publicist, Sae, Shido, a handful of unknown and blocked numbers (that could very well have also been his father), and finally, Ren.

Goro briefly entertains the idea of dialling into his voicemail, but he has a feeling that the sound of his father shouting down the receiver might be the thing that's finally loud enough to wake the boy beside him. So he opens the messaging app instead, scrolling quickly to the bottom so that he can read the older texts first.

All of his bills and rent have always been paid by Shido, and since he doesn't appear to have any missed calls or angry messages from his landlord (and his phone service clearly hasn't been cut off), he has to assume that they're all still being taken care of, somehow. Probably automatically, from some offshore account that the authorities haven't tracked down yet.

Moving on, he finds himself amused by the increasingly annoyed and vaguely panicked texts from his publicist and his agent. Apparently, he'd had three TV spots and an autograph signing booked before he dropped off the face of the earth. Perhaps it's mean-spirited of him — they were only doing their jobs after all — but it really is hard not to find it funny.

Acting like something so trivial was the literal end of the world.

They're bridges that he's happy to have burned, honestly. If he ever sets foot in another godforsaken TV studio again, it will be too soon.

There are also messages from the prosecutor's office, the police station and even a handful (inexplicably) from concerned classmates. None of it really stands out as significant or important, right up until he almost scrolls past Sae's name.

The date on the text is from nearly a week after what happened in the bowels of that cursed ship.

-Sae Niijima-
19/12/2016
9:32 p.m.

Sae: Akechi-kun, Makoto told me about what happened...
Sae: I should have noticed something.
Sae: I should have been the adult that you felt like you could reach out to. Maybe I could have done something to help.
Sae: I feel like I failed you, Akechi-kun. I'm so sorry.

Reading that has left him feeling slightly… strange. While Goro really does genuinely like and respect Sae, he'd been nothing other than passive-aggressive and unpleasant to her in the last few months of their working relationship. Having been under strict orders from Shido to undermine her confidence and help contribute to the formation of her budding Palace, he'd turned needling her into an art. All so that they would have a nice controlled space to corner and trap the Phantom Thieves.

He's surprised, confused, and more than a little touched that she felt the need to go out of her way to apologise to him, of all people.

Reading back over what she said a couple of times, he frowns down at the screen before backing out to start scrolling again.

The vast majority of the correspondence dries up as the dates get closer to the end of December, which is slightly peculiar and more than a little disconcerting. Trying to think of an explanation, he realises that he does vaguely remember Ren saying something about Yaldabaoth trying to erase the Phantom Thieves from the public consciousness around that time.

Could he have been caught up in some sort of collateral damage?

Or is he actually just that forgettable?

Sighing, he resumes scrolling.

The group chat that they'd all used in January is gone, of course — wiped out of existence when the timeline reset itself — but the one from November is still there and, strangely enough, there are actually a handful of new notifications. It's with genuine confusion that he taps the icon for the thread and scrolls up to the last read reply.

It's his own, from the night before they went in to steal Sae's treasure, and it's impossible not to cringe as he reads it ('What a wonderful, trusting relationship. I will do my best in this as well.'), particularly when he can remember just how clever he thought he was being when he wrote it.

It's excruciating, and he can't scroll away fast enough.

The next reply is from the 13th of December.

The day he 'died'.

-Casino Heist 🃏 Jokers are Wild-
13/12/2016
6:17 p.m.

Ren: Akechi, we meant what we said in the palace

Ryuji: yeah man! help us take down ur shitty dad!

Futaba: im still mad at u! but im a sucker 4 a good redemption arc! lets do this
ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ

Makoto: You're not just some tool to be used and discarded, Akechi-kun.

Yusuke: I certainly feel that there would be a certain poetic justice to it — if you were to be instrumental in Shido's defeat.

Ann: We'll change that bastard's heart together!

Haru: You need to atone for everything you've done, Akechi-kun. This can be the first step towards making things right.

It's nothing more, essentially, than what they'd already expressed to him in the engine room, but it still hits him like a punch to the gut, regardless. He scrubs at his eyes angrily with his free hand and pretends that it doesn't come away wet as he moves down the thread.

18/12/2016
8:12 p.m.

Ren: He confessed, Akechi. We did it

Makoto: My sister is going to make sure that he pays for his crimes, Akechi-kun.

Ann: Akechi… I hope that you've found peace, wherever you are.

Goro is not going to cry.

His eyes are just blurry because he's tired. It has nothing to do with this pack of goodie-goodie, bleeding heart, assholes.

Feeling grateful and spiteful in equal parts, he quickly taps out a response (just a simple 'thank you') and thinks about what a shame it is that he won't be able to witness their reactions to it in person. Oh, to be a fly on the wall when they see that there's been a reply from beyond the grave.

Hitting send before he can change his mind, Goro then spends a few moments dragging his metaphorical heels about checking the last unread message.

It's from Ren.

No surprise there.

While he's still deliberating about whether he should just delete it without reading it, like a coward, he gets another incoming text. It's a private message from Futaba Sakura, which is, honestly, something he never thought he'd be on the receiving end of.

It's on theme for the night as a whole, really.

-Futaba Sakura-
19/03/2017
5:46 a.m.

Futaba: thats some top tier trolling
Futaba: respect ಠᴗಠ
Futaba: but jsyk
Futaba: if u hurt Ren
Futaba: again
Futaba: i have a butt tonne of cringy stuff on u that i can leak
Futaba: srsly tho
Futaba: ...
Futaba: welcome back [¬º-°]¬

He isn't surprised that she apparently already knows about his return, not really, and he can't even find it in himself to be annoyed with her for trying to threaten him either. Mostly because he could not give one single shit about his reputation at this point anyway, but also because he knows that her threats are born from concern rather than out of any kind of malice.

Goro doesn't think he could ever be so accommodating if their roles were reversed.

Goro: Understood.
Goro: And thank you, Sakura.

And if Sakura, of all people, can muster up the nerve to message him, then he should be able to stop being so spineless and read a simple fucking text. Even so, he does still have to take a second to steel himself before backing out to the main screen of his messaging app and finally opening the thread he shared with Ren.

-Ren Amamiya-
13/12/2016
10:24 p.m.

Ren: I still have your glove
Ren: Don't forget about our promise

18/12/2016
9:16 p.m.

Ren: We changed his heart
Ren: He confessed, live on TV
Ren: I hope you saw it

19/12/2016
11:36 p.m.

Ren: You're hiding out somewhere, right?
Ren: It should be safe to come back now

24/12/2016
8:03 p.m.

Ren: So... I'm gonna turn myself in. Makoto's sister says they need my testimony to help put Shido away
Ren: I'll probably be in juvenile detention for a while, but it'll be worth it
Ren: Probably

13/02/2017
2:00 p.m.

Ren: Well, they let me out…
Ren: It's weird. I've got two sets of memories from Christmas Eve until now
Ren: Nobody knows what happened to you, it's driving me crazy
Ren: I just hope you're happy and safe

14/02/2017
11:57 p.m.

Ren: I'm a dumbass, I should have told you how I felt
Ren: Happy Valentine's Day, Akechi

03/03/2017
1:28 a.m.

Ren: I miss you
Ren: You'd probably hate that, right?

17/03/2017
10:38 p.m.

Ren: I'm going home in a few days
Ren: Just letting you know, on the off chance that you come looking for me…
Ren: Sorry, I know that this is probably just "brainless sentimentality" to you. Haha

Goro's grip on his phone tightens, and he blinks hard to clear away the annoyingly persistent tears that are obscuring his vision. Reading all of that had hurt; there's no point in denying it, but what's worse is the fact that Ren is apparently going home.

In a matter of days.

And he hadn't said anything.

Granted, there had been little opportunity for Ren to bring it up, but it's the kind of information that definitely ranks higher in Goro's priorities than being told that he should be fucking happy!

He glares down at where Ren is sleeping peacefully beside him and is seriously considering shaking him awake when a dizzying wave of vertigo suddenly hits him like a fucking truck.

Before he can even catch his breath, more lightheadedness washes over him, and it's abnormal and unnatural in a way that he can't begin to try to comprehend. His consciousness feels like it's circling a drain — like reality itself has become slippery and blurry around the edges. Teetering drunkenly to the right, he has to use the last of his strength and control to push himself forward so that he ends up in a slumped sitting position, folded in half over his own legs, rather than landing directly on Ren's head.

He wonders, in a detached sort of way, if he's having a stroke, or an aneurysm, or something else equally unavoidable and mundane, because now his eyes feel like they're literally being pulled closed. He fights it, but it's like there's a disconnect between his eyelids and his brain, and they slide shut, by themselves, and entirely against his will.

There's a disorienting shift underneath and around him, and his stomach flip-flops unpleasantly, like it would if he had just gone over a particularly steep part of the track on a rollercoaster. The metaphor holds true, unfortunately, because then he's free-falling for several, terrifying seconds (fully convinced that this is it, that after everything else, this is the entirely stupid fucking way that he dies), before the world jerks to a stop.

He can almost swear that he feels his brain keep going, moving with the inertia until it smacks into the front of his skull.

Then his ears pop, the bizarre pulling-pressure is suddenly gone, and everything starts to feel more solid again. Sensation creeps back into his limbs, and with it, comes basic awareness.

Wherever he is, it's not Ren's bed; he knows that much at least.

He's also sitting up, and when he flexes his fingers, he can feel gloves on his hands.

What the hell?

His eyes finally do as they're fucking told and open.

Initially blinded by the harsh light, déjà vu prickles through him unpleasantly as he blinks and squints, trying to force his vision to adjust.

Well, shit.

He's sitting in his usual spot on a very familiar couch, on a very familiar stage, under very bright and, unfortunately, also very familiar lights. It's an impressively convincing imitation of the TV studio in Akasaka Mitsuke, lovingly recreated and perfectly rendered down to the smallest detail.

All except for the colour.

Because it's all fucking blue.

"My apologies, I had to use more force than is usually necessary to summon you here."

The soft and annoyingly polite voice comes from somewhere to his left, and Goro whips around to find that goddamned bellboy — Theodore, his name is Theodore — sitting, all prim and proper, in the host's seat.

"You can't be fucking serious!" Goro snarls, and he probably would have been up out of his seat and swinging if he wasn't still so disoriented. "Why the hell am I back here?!"

Theodore, for his part, blinks owlishly at him for only a second before composing himself and speaking. "I understand that you must be frustrated and probably more than a little, ah, discombobulated, but rest assured, I just wish to speak with you, for a moment, on my master's behalf."

"And what does he want with me?"

"My master has reason to believe that fate will present you with an opportunity in the near future, and that, as a Wild Card, you might benefit from signing a contract…" Theodore makes a sweeping gesture with his hand, over the low table between them. A clipboard and pen appear there, from nothing, like a magic trick. "And becoming an official guest of the Velvet Room."

The anger that was vibrating through Goro has already faded to something closer to a low hum. It's just background noise now. He knows an opportunity when he's being presented with one.

"Does that mean that I would have the same power as Ren?"

"It means," Theodore says, folding his hands together demurely in his lap, "that you would have the potential, yes. Do not forget that Wild Cards are only ever as strong as the bonds that they forge."

Goro makes a frustrated sound through his teeth. There's no way he'll ever be as proficient as Ren is when it comes to making and maintaining connections with other people, but power is power, and he won't let this chance pass him by.

It should be safe enough, he reasons. Ren obviously trusts the beings in this strange pocket dimension, and there's also the minor matter of how they already saved his life once before. And then spent months watching over his soul, like magical nursemaids, for some reason.

"I just need to sign a contract?"

Theodore nods, and then tilts his head to the side, smiling sweetly. Goro freezes in the process of reaching for the pen. He feels his eyes narrow in suspicion as he's struck again by the strange paranoid feeling he'd experienced the last time he spoke with this man.

It's a little like looking at himself in a funhouse mirror.

There are no real physical similarities between the two of them, other than both being on the 'pretty' side of conventionally attractive, he supposes. It's the mannerisms. A disarming smile paired with slightly bumbling bashfulness, formal speech that just manages to come down on the right side of awkward, and a gloved hand raised to the chin to complete the perfect picture of attentive contemplation. They're all unnervingly close to his own affectations.

Not that any of it had ever been genuine when Goro was doing it, of course, and he knows that there's a (not insignificant) chance that he's just being self-absorbed — that this might just be Theodore's actual personality. If something so bland and vacuous can truly be called that.

Still, it gives him pause...

There's no harm, surely, in pushing for a little more information before he puts pen to paper. "And why are you here? Why not one of your sisters?"

Why did they send me 'Detective Prince - Bellboy Edition'? Goro thinks but doesn't say, because that's definitely coming from somewhere egocentric.

"Oh?" Theodore looks taken aback and somewhat flustered, but not offended. "Yes, well, usually my master would produce a new attendant for a new guest. That requires a substantial amount of power, however, and he is still recovering," he says. "As for why I have been chosen to be your attendant rather than one of my sisters? It is simply because I am in the unique position, amongst my siblings, of not having an assigned guest. Technically."

"Technically?" Goro frowns. What does that mean?

"Yes, technically," Theodore confirms, but doesn't elaborate. There might be something sad in his expression when he says it, but it's gone so quickly that Goro isn't completely sure that it was actually there at all. Especially when it's replaced, inexplicably, with a coy look and a blush that would be more at home on the face of a bashful schoolgirl, rather than whatever the fuck Theodore actually is. "It was also assumed that you would find my form more pleasing than that of my sisters."

Ah.

Well, isn't that presumptuous?

Truthfully, he's rapidly beginning to think he was being too generous, entertaining the idea that there was some kind of nefarious plot to get under his skin by aping his Pleasant Boy façade.

"Don't flatter yourself," Goro laughs, without any real humour. "You remind me far too much of someone I hold in extremely low regard."

"Ah, well, that is a pity." Theodore fidgets uncomfortably in his seat, and the awkwardness certainly seems authentic. "It was only ever intended to be a starting point for the connection between an attendant and their guest; in much the same way that the appearance of my younger sister, Lavenza, was meant to provoke a protective, fraternal response in your companion."

It does make sense for them to try to appeal to Ren's extreme (and borderline self-destructive) empathy and compassion — and truly? What could be a better way to get him to let his guard down than to present him with something cute and seemingly harmless? It's exactly the tactic he'd employed when he first approached Ren himself, after all, hiding bloody teeth and claws under soft sheep's fleece.

With that in mind, the contrast only becomes sharper by comparison. As an attendant, Lavenza fits Ren. Far more than the flimsy (and borderline offensive) reasoning that's apparently behind this attempt to foist Theodore off on Goro. As if his personality can be boiled down and reduced to the simple fact that he prefers the company of men.

Because truly, if they were going to be smart about it, they should have sent Margaret instead and exploited his crippling parental abandonment issues.

Amateurs.

"I don't think that trying to play the Honeypot is the best way to start any working relationship, Theodore-san," Goro offers, slightly indulgently, because he's beginning to think that Theodore and his ilk are actually just a bit dim — or at least, not well versed in what exactly makes humans tick. "And it's particularly ineffective if you admit to it, unprompted, and three sentences into your sales pitch."

Theodore sits up straight (or straighter) and looks at him with such open and intense interest that Goro almost expects him to pull out a pad and start taking notes. Suddenly, he seems less like someone trying to be the Detective Prince, and a lot more like a parallel universe version of Yusuke Kitagawa.

"I see! That is incredibly helpful! I do not know the term 'Honeypot', but I think that I can infer the meaning from context…" He pauses, frowns and then abruptly stands, bending at the waist in a deep bow. "I wish to apologise. Sincerely. This has been an inauspicious start to what I am hoping will be a productive arrangement, and I would very much like to wipe the slate clean and try again. If that is acceptable to you."

Goro was already on his feet and bowing back before Theodore had even finished what he was saying, mostly out of reflex (rather than any genuine goodwill), and he has to wonder if being in this fake studio has flipped some etiquette switch in his brain.

Whatever, it's fine; he'll just roll with it. It's not like there's any real reason (beyond pettiness) to make this exchange needlessly antagonistic, after all.

"There's no need to apologise, Theodore-san. I'm equally at fault for any misunderstanding between us," he lies. The words come out easily, and through a polite, even smile. "I would be more than happy to start over. If that's what you want."

Absent-mindedly, Goro brushes at nonexistent dust on the front of his slacks before retaking his seat, and Theodore follows suit. There's a small and clearly expectant smile on his face, and it widens a little as Goro reaches out to pick the metal pen up off the table.

It feels expensively heavy and strangely familiar in his hand (he wouldn't be surprised if it was the same one, somehow, that he'd used to sign his emancipation papers in Shido's office, years ago), and the ink flows smoothly and pleasantly as he signs his name on the dotted line.

Just as he finishes the final stroke in the last character of his name, it's as if something shifts — or releases — inside his chest, and Goro realises, as the strangeness dissipates, that he can feel Hereward there again, for the first time since all of this madness started.

That's reassuring, at least. It certainly seems like he's made the right decision.

"Wonderful!" Theodore exclaims, annoyingly chipper. Raising his hands in front of him, he claps, once — a clipped, brisk motion that makes both the clipboard and the pen disappear back into the ether. "And now, with that business taken care of, I actually have a small welcoming gift for you."

"Oh?" Instantly suspicious, Goro has to remind himself to keep smiling. "Is that so?"

With a flourish, Theodore holds up one gloved hand. There are two cards, both blue, held delicately between his index and middle fingers.

"Normally — and in the future — a payment is required if you wish to summon Personas from the compendium. However, that seems somewhat unfair, given that you fused these two without having the process, or the consequences, explained to you beforehand."

"What-" Goro begins, but then the cards in Theodore's hand dissolve into a small cloud of sparkling blue dust, and he finds himself rendered speechless.

A sudden wave of warmth washes over him, and he feels it gather and coalesce in the centre of his chest, thrumming pleasantly as it settles into two distinct and wonderfully familiar shapes in his soul. Robin Hood and Loki slip right back into place, as if they'd never left, nestled safely inside of him, next to Hereward.

Oh, that feels good.

"Thank you, Theodore-san," Goro says, once he finds his voice again, and he means it.

"Please, call me Theo," he replies, sounding very satisfied with himself. "And now, my treasured guest, I believe that it is time for you to return to your time of rest."

Goro's eyes start closing of their own accord again.

He doesn't fight it this time.

Chapter Text

Ren is one of those people who would have said, once upon a time, that he didn't really dream when he slept — or, at least, he never used to remember any of them if he did.

It always left him with a kind of niggling impression that he was missing out on something, or (more worryingly) that there was something actually wrong with him — that he was cut off from some deep and important part of himself. He thinks, in hindsight, that maybe it's part of why he'd spent the first sixteen years of his life feeling as if he was just... kind of... existing, instead of actually living.

Floating aimlessly from task to task, and from day to day, just mindlessly ticking the boxes. For no real reason, really, other than the fact that it was what he felt like he was supposed to be doing.

'Keep your nose clean' has always been his dad's favourite phrase. Usually yelled after Ren just as he's leaving the house, or combined with an awkward shoulder-pat during a pep talk before starting a new school term. In some form or other, it's probably the only hard rule that his parents ever really impressed upon him growing up.

Nothing else mattered as long as he stayed out of trouble.

So that's what he's always done. Ren worked hard, both in school and at his part-time job. He took part in clubs. He had a handful of acceptable friends and an acceptable girlfriend, and most importantly, he never caused problems for his parents.

He wasn't satisfied or fulfilled, but it wasn't like he was unhappy either.

It was comfortable.

It was fine.

Everything was always fine.

And when the questions came (more and more with each passing year), about what he wanted to do when he graduated, he'd just shrug and go with some stock answer about getting a nice, reliable civil service job like his dad. Or, if he really wanted to mix it up, he might say that he was thinking about following his mom into education instead, just like her father and his father before him.

Which, you know, he had absolutely zero interest in doing either of those things, but he also hadn't really wanted to do anything else... so, why not?

Ren knows that he probably would've just continued on down that path, sleepwalking his way through life like a zombie. Gone to college and studied something he wasn't interested in, got a boring job, married someone that he liked (but probably didn't quite love), and so on. Until he died. Having lived a life that wasn't bad, by any stretch of the imagination, but had just been kind of okay.

But then, less than a week after his sixteenth birthday, he'd turned a corner and found this bald asshole trying to force himself on a woman.

And something in him had just snapped.

He'd never known that he could be so angry, never known what rage truly felt like — not until he got dragged over the coals for daring to step in and try to help someone else. It really spoke to how sheltered his small-town upbringing had been, right? To get to sixteen years old before ever experiencing real injustice. As lessons go, it was a painful one, but it was also exhilarating, in a way? Like someone was sparking a flint inside of him and kindling the rebellious fire in his soul that would, later, manifest as his Persona.

Life up until that point might as well have been the dream. Everything afterwards had seemed a little sharper, a little louder, and so much more real. Just like Tokyo itself. Terrifying, thrilling, and almost overwhelming.

And with Tokyo came the Metaverse, and Arsène, and the Phantom Thieves. Ren wonders, sometimes, if Yaldabaoth had actually reached into his mind and flipped some magic switch, because (on top of everything else) he'd gone from only being left with the faintest impression of his dreams to them being extremely vivid and sometimes lucid. Even the simple ones about spending time with his friends became bright and warm, and stuck with him for days afterwards.

It's this newfound awareness that lets him feel how he's sliding sideways through his subconscious now, out of the pleasant dream he was having (about sleeping on the fluffy chest of a giant Morgana), and into a different and familiar one. A dream that he's had many times, and not a nice one, by any means, but it's also never really quite qualified as a full-on nightmare either.

No, his proper nightmares tend to focus on one, very specific, room that's hidden away in the basement of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Headquarters.

The grind of wrist bones against metal cuffs. The slide of a cold needle under his skin. A black boot pressing down on the side of his head.

Wheezing and tasting blood on the exhale, wondering if he's punctured a lung on his own broken ribs.

His thoughts slow, and dark, and dim. Knowing that there's something important that he's supposed to remember, that he has to remember, and that something very bad is going to happen if he doesn't.

Messing it up anyway and saying the wrong thing, or forgetting the right thing, hearing the door open and then the click of a gun's safety.

The unyielding press of a metal barrel against his forehead.

Those thoughts slip away, like grains of sand through his fingers, as the not-nightmare solidifies around him. Wind whips around his face, ruffling his hair and filling his nose with the salty smell of the sea, and when Ren's dream-self opens his eyes he has to squint against the sun.

Mount Fuji is on the horizon, the summit almost blindingly white against the blue sky.

It should feel like home (because that's where he is, after all), but it's all janky and wrong, and every single one of his senses feels raw around the edges and uncomfortably overloaded.

Boots crunching too loudly on their gravel driveway, each of his steps kicks up exaggerated plumes of grit and dust that puff up around his feet and rasp like sandpaper on his eardrums.

The plants in his mom's flower beds are too bright — the colours so vibrant that it's almost synthetic. Reminding him of the time Yusuke messed up the saturation setting on his crappy little CRT TV, trying, and failing, to make the images in the art documentary they were watching 'pop'.

Even the birdsong that cuts through the morning air is grating rather than sweet, jarring and slightly off-key.

Crunch, crunch, crunch, go his feet.

Closer and closer, carrying him towards the weathered, powder blue door. The one with the brass door knocker — an old, ugly thing his parents had bought on their honeymoon trip through Europe. It's supposed to look like it's made up of tastefully twisted vines but, to Ren, it always seemed more like an angry (and kind of hungry) face. The sun bounces off its curves, casting unpleasant shadows and making it glint menacingly, in a way that reminds him of just how much it used to scare him when he was little. Back when he'd been convinced that it was waiting patiently, like a predator, for the perfect opportunity to bite his fingers off.

His dream-self stops at the door and takes a second to readjust the bag that's slung over his shoulder, like always, but it's about nine pounds too light. Ren knows that Morgana isn't in there. He knows that he's alone.

Tweet, tweet, tweet, sing the birds.

Already knowing that it won't turn as he reaches for it, Ren tries the handle. It doesn't budge, not even a little, even though nobody locks their doors in the little corner of Kanbara that his family calls home.

After all, that would be too much like pointing your finger at your neighbour, wouldn't it? When everyone knows everyone else, what's there to worry about?

But the door is still locked in his dream. It's always locked in his dream, and the only reason for that is to keep him out, specifically, because—

—he's an embarrassment, he's a burden, he was meant to mind his own business and stay out of trouble, like the good boy he was supposed to be.

"Should have kept that nose clean, kiddo."

It's on that happy note that this dream usually ends.

Not tonight, though, apparently. He's still standing in front of the door while the tone-deaf birds continue to sing away in the background.

Weird.

But honestly? He's starting to feel a little morbidly curious… wondering what his brain is cooking up and planning to throw at him now.

Right up until his hand starts moving by itself again, up and away from the door handle, and it quickly becomes very obvious that he's not going to enjoy what's coming next.

Oh.

Oh, crap.

The dread is real, and heavy, and suffocating, as he watches his hand reach out for the door knocker — in all the versions of this dream that he's had, not one of them has ever involved him touching that creepy thing.

Ren holds his breath (as much as is possible in a dream, anyway) as his fingers slip through and around the metal loop.

…

Nothing happens.

Okay, his fingers might have closed around it without anything terrible happening, but he still can't quite find it in himself to relax. How can he? When it feels unpleasantly warm and suspiciously slimy, and he can almost swear that it pulses when he tightens his grip.

Yeah, no thanks.

He'd like to get off this ride now.

The thing is, it doesn't really seem like that's going to be his decision to make. Ren's hand lifts the brass ring with no input from him, knocking once, then twice — each one sounding more like a gunshot, painfully and unrealistically loud in the suddenly quiet air.

The birds have stopped singing.

Well, that's ominous.

Ren braces himself for everything to go sideways — and, oh boy, does it ever.

Because he can't pull his hand back. He's stuck fast.

Someone might as well have piped ice water into his veins as the realisation settles over him. He's stuck. He's trapped! And not only has the brass loop shrunk around his fingers, it's also getting tighter with each passing second! Constricting around his digits like a snake trying to crush and suffocate its prey.

Oh, no, no, no, no!

And if Ren actually had any consistent control over his body here, he would be struggling for all he's worth right now — would give almost anything to be able to plant both feet on either side of the door frame to try to get enough leverage to yank himself free. Let's be real, he'd probably also be hollering his head off, but the 'logic' of this dream dictates that all he's allowed to do is watch. Trapped behind his own eyes as this version of him just stands there dumbly while his hand gets crushed.

One of his knuckles gives under the pressure with a sickeningly loud pop, and he gets as close to a scream as someone can without actually being able to open their mouth. Desperately, he scrambles to remind himself that this is just a dream, and that no matter how real it feels, he's still going to wake up with all of his fingers intact and accounted for.

Still hurts like a bitch, though; there's no rationalising that away.

There's a second pop, and another eye watering spike of pain to go along with it, but strangely, his lack of agency in the situation is kind of... not quite calming him down, no — but it's taking the edge off, at least.

More numb than afraid now, he feels a little like he might slip into that grey place that had been his only refuge when Shido's goons had been whaling on him back in November.

Huh.

Can you even dissociate in a dream?

Resigned to his role of chew toy/unwilling bystander, he waits for the sound of crunching bone… but it never comes. And maybe his lack of fear is making things too boring for whatever part of his subconscious is trying to torture him, because his surroundings lurch around him instead, like someone hit the emergency stop button on the escalator he never asked to be on.

As the dream shifts into something else, the relief he feels is sweet and immediate, despite the overwhelming disorientation that comes with it.

Ren blinks.

The pain in his hand is gone.

He's inside the house now. In the living room specifically. And everything is very tall… or he's very small. The decor is on the fuzzy side of familiar, half remembered, probably because it hasn't looked like this since he was five or six years old.

Also, he really needs to take a leak all of a sudden.

Is that part of the dream? Or does he actually need to use the bathroom in reality? Either way, he's not complaining. He'll take an uncomfortably full bladder over broken fingers any day.

His feet are bare now, and he scrunches his toes against the slightly rough pile of the antique rug he's standing on. It belonged to his grandmother originally — although Ren was so small when she passed away that he doesn't really remember her actually having it — and he knows that his grandparents left it to their only daughter (Ren's mom) in their will.

Even in a dream, it's a beautiful piece, decorated with delicately woven leaves, vines, and pretty pink nadeshiko flowers (his grandmother's favourite plant and his mom's namesake). He can still remember how much he used to love playing on it. Imagining the deepest, darkest jungles on its surface for his action figures and toy animals to creep through.

The thing is, the rug's not in their living room anymore. Nope, it was rolled up and put away into storage years ago.

It took him a minute, but he suddenly knows exactly where this dream is going.

And while it's definitely better than dealing with carnivorous door accessories, it's still not great.

Right on time, he starts to feel the sweaty, prickly burn of a fever over his skin. How it sticks his hair to his forehead and his Jack Frost PJ's to his small and skinny five-year-old body.

He's not supposed to be out of bed, but he opens his mouth to call for his mom anyway, because he feels—

—so bad. His head hurts. His tummy feels yucky. He needs the potty. He wants his mommy…

A big wet patch blooms on the rug under his feet, like a mockery of the flowers that decorate it, and his pyjama pants are soaked through as well, because he's gone and wet himself, even though—

—he's five and a half now, and he's supposed to be a big boy.

There's a strangled gasp from the living room doorway, and Ren's dream-self sways unsteadily on his small feet when he turns towards the sound.

"Look at what you did!" his mom cries. Her face is bright red. She looks so mad, and while she's never hit him (neither of his parents have ever raised a hand to him, not really), he's still terrified when she crosses the room and grabs him by the arm so roughly that it nearly pulls him off his feet.

His dad curses under his breath from behind her, rubbing at the spot between his eyebrows with the side of his thumb — a nervous tic that Ren recognises as something his father does when he's trying to stay calm. And Ren's never sure how much of this is the dream and how much is genuine memory, but it's like his dad can't even look at him. As if a little boy with the flu having an accident is the most offensive thing in the world.

"This is unacceptable, Ren. You're too old for this."

Ren should be angry, but the only thing he feels is shame, and it bubbles and curdles unpleasantly in his stomach.

Then he's crying, he's crying so much, and he's trying to say that he's sorry, that he can clean up the mess (he's five and doesn't have the first clue about how to do that, but he can still remember wanting to — wanting to do anything to make them stop looking at him like that), but he can't get the words out because his breath is stuck, and he feels like his brain is on fire.

Everything goes black.

And that's where the dream ends. Probably because that's also where his memory ends. Five-year-old Ren had fainted dead away, right there on the ruined rug.

Although he can still remember a little of what happened afterwards. How he'd woken up, clean, dry and tucked into his bed, being watched over by the local doctor and his two worried, loving parents.

It was easy, as time went on, and the memory became more and more fuzzy, for him to kid himself that he'd only imagined them ever being anything else.

That was until they had to come pick him up at the police station, just over ten years later, and he'd seen exactly the same look of disgusted disappointment and anger on their faces. He was sixteen then, and he knew that he was in the right, but their expressions had still made him feel like he was five years old all over again. Small and ashamed.

He doesn't think that they're bad parents, not by a long shot, and especially compared to the parents/guardians that some of his friends have had to grow up with. He loves them, and he's sure that they love him too, despite the cold shoulder that they've been giving him ever since his arrest.

Ren does wonder, though, sometimes, if it can really be called love at all if it dries up the second that things become difficult.

…

Thankfully, his sleep is mostly dreamless after that. Just floating in the warm darkness of his subconscious while all of his solid thoughts bleed away, taking all the anger and the guilt with them. He stays like that for what could be seconds or hours, but the hazy quality of his consciousness eventually starts to fade and awareness creeps in slowly instead.

The first thing he registers as he comes to is that he's way too warm, and then that he's really sweaty and a little sticky…

Why is he sticky?

His throat also feels weird — gooey and kind of sore — when he swallows, like maybe he's coming down with something.

Trying to turn over doesn't work. He's trapped under something — something very warm and very heavy. Holy cow, there might as well be a literal tonne of bricks piled on top of his midsection.

Morgana seriously needs to cut back on the fatty tuna.

Still half asleep, he reaches out to pet his friend — hoping to convince him to move and stop crushing his organs while he's at it — but Ren just ends up feeling like some of the wires in his brain get crossed. Because while his fingers do still end up buried in soft hair, it's not anything like the short, plush cat fur he was expecting.

Huh?

After spending a couple of confused seconds groggily petting at the long silky strands (and getting his fingers a little tangled in them in the process), his wrist is suddenly caught in a punishingly tight grip.

It's almost a morning tradition for Ren: being lightly mauled when Morgana wakes up, so the pain being visited upon his poor, innocent wrist isn't a huge shock. No, the surprise is that he's not being assaulted by claws (or little needle teeth), but by a strong and distinctly human hand.

He's just starting to worry that someone turned his cat into a dude again when the hand holding his wrist twists and bends it at an odd angle, increasing the pressure steadily until he has no choice but to withdraw his abused limb to cradle it against his chest.

Ouch.

Why does the universe suddenly seem to have such a hard-on for hurting his hands?

"And what exactly do you think you're doing?" Goro Akechi's voice is rough with sleep but still sharp as a blade, and it cuts through Ren's remaining brain fog with the same efficiency.

His eyes snap open.

Then his stomach and his heart try to switch places.

Everything that happened last night comes back to him in a rush (Goro is here! He's alive! They kissed! And more — a whole lot more! Holy shit!), and any leftover crappiness he was feeling from his depressing dreams is smothered by the horde of butterflies that are suddenly fluttering up a storm in his stomach.

Propping himself up on one elbow, he gets a better look at the weirdly perpendicular position that Goro has, somehow, managed to get himself into during the night — lying on his side, facing the head of the bed, with one foot on the floor and his upper body draped across Ren's stomach.

Which explains why he woke up feeling like he was being crushed to death, at least.

Their eyes meet, and Ren feels like his insides go all soft and gooey.

Goro is watching him closely, obviously wary. Pale-faced, with heavy bags under his (still slightly red and puffy) eyes. He looks like he slept terribly.

He's also probably the most beautiful thing that Ren has ever seen.

Yeah, he's definitely got it bad.

What's the appropriate amount of time to wait, after someone comes back from the dead (or after they try to kill you), before you tell them you think you might be in love with them?

"Hi," Ren says instead, doing a wiggly little finger-wave and smiling a smile that he knows probably makes him look like a total goofball.

Which tracks, because he absolutely feels like one.

"Good morning, Ren." Goro sounds guarded and a little unsure, but there's fondness there too, and when he smiles back, it's slightly lopsided and heart-stoppingly cute. Not at all like the perfectly symmetrical and manufactured Detective Prince smiles. Ren's stomach does a happy little somersault.

Goro opens and closes his mouth like he wants to say something, but then seems to give up, settling instead for peering at Ren with way more scrutiny than he's prepared for when he's only been awake for about five minutes.

"Uh, is something wrong?"

"I had a visit from — or perhaps, it would be more correct to say that I was forced to visit — one of your friends from the Velvet Room last night."

Ren sits up as straight as he can without dislodging the boy who's essentially in his lap.

"Why? What did they want?"

"It was the one called Theodore — you remember him, yes?" Goro pauses, eyebrows raised in a pair of expectant arches, and only continues when Ren nods. "He offered me power in exchange for signing a contract, and then he gave Robin Hood and Loki back to me… He also mentioned something called a 'compendium'? Apparently, he'll be playing the role of attendant for me, as Lavenza does for you… Not that I can really say that I understand what any of that means."

Heart beating a mile a minute (and with his thoughts moving just as fast), Ren does his best to explain everything he knows about both the Velvet Room and fusing Personas. Goro looks understandably shocked when he gets to the part about the electric chair and guillotines. Ren's gotten so used to it all by now, that he sometimes forgets just how weird the whole thing is.

Once he's finished, Goro hums thoughtfully and says, "It makes sense now…" He sounds a little wistful; it's cute. "How you always seemed to have far more Personas available to you than I ever saw you negotiate with... To think that you were able to literally fuse them to make more — no wonder I could never anticipate you."

"Well, now you can do it too," Ren smiles, feeling very warm and kind of tingly.

"Not quite — with the Nav gone, there's no way to actually access the Metaverse currently. I assume that I will have to wait for the 'opportunity' that Theodore mentioned before I'll be able to test out my new abilities..." Trailing off, he looks up at Ren with that sharp consideration again.

"Have I got something on my face, or are you just enjoying the view?" Ren teases.

And that might make Goro scowl, but he also blushes a little, so Ren counts it as a win. "A specific word keeps coming to mind when I look at you now, and I don't know why."

"Dashing? Handsome? Majestic?"

"Fool."

"Wow," Ren deadpans. "You really know how to sweet-talk a guy."

"I'm not actually calling you a fool—" Goro sounds (and looks) extremely unimpressed, "—you absolute dolt."

And maybe he's onto something, because it took way longer than it probably should have for Ren to connect the dots.

"Do you remember what I said about how all the different Personas I have can be divided into arcana?" Ren asks and Goro nods, making an impatient, twirly motion with his hand that obviously means 'get on with it' — so Ren does. "Ever since my first visit to the Velvet Room, all of my important relationships have also had an arcana associated with them. My first Persona, Arsène, is the Fool arcana — so, uh, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that I am too… Morgana, though, he's Magician, Ryuji's Chariot—" And Ren counts the rest of the list out on his fingers until he's gone through each one.

Well, almost.

Of course, Goro catches the omission immediately. "And what about me?"

There's no avoiding it, so he doesn't try. "Justice."

Inhaling sharply, Goro's eyes go wide, and his face twists and seems to cycle through the beginnings of three or four different expressions before he settles on something indulgent and condescending.

"I suppose that I would have come across that way when we first met, hmm?" Oh, his voice is like honey. Ren thinks that he might be in danger of drowning in it. "Such a pity that it was all a farce."

"You're wrong."

Flinching, Goro's lip hitches up into a sneer.

Ren takes a breath and tries again.

"I've never known anyone as committed to their own ideal of justice as you are, Goro. You gave literally everything you had to get your revenge on Shido, and the way you fought for your — for everyone's — freedom from Maruki-sensei's reality, even though you thought it meant that you were going to die doing it… None of that was a farce."

Goro doesn't respond right away, just continues to stare up at him, eyebrows drawn together and mouth set in a grim line as his eyes rove over Ren's face. Like he's looking for some kind of tell — any kind of indicator that Ren doesn't believe what he's saying.

"You really are a fool," Goro whispers eventually, with a small sigh. Seemingly satisfied.

"Maybe," Ren replies and leans down to kiss him.

The angle is awkward, and Ren has to twist and nearly fold double over himself just to line their mouths up, but man, it's worth it for the way that Goro melts against his lips.

He smooths the hair away from Goro's face, runs his thumb across one cheekbone, and presses a gentle kiss to his forehead just before pulling back. Looking down into warm brown eyes, Ren thinks again of love.

And drowning.

Let's be real, though, there are definitely some other feelings creeping in alongside the more romantic ones. He is only human after all, and Goro is very distracting, and to top it off, Ren almost always wakes up with at least a semi, anyway. It really doesn't take much at all for his dick to decide to make the jump to full hardness, is what he's saying.

The horny fog clouding his brain isn't helped by the fact that he's just now noticing how Goro's t-shirt is rucked up a little, exposing the lower half of his stomach and the pretty trail of hair there. Ren's eyes follow it like a magnet. Down from his belly button to where it disappears tantalisingly under the waistband of his borrowed sweatpants. The soft material they're made of is doing absolutely nothing to conceal the fact that Goro has also had a visit from the Morning Wood Fairy.

Or maybe he's just very happy to be here.

They should probably sit down and have a conversation (about relationship stuff, the whole 'going home' thing, and what exactly Goro is going to do with himself now that he's not dead), right? Before he gets too caught up in that particular horny train of thought.

But he ends up getting distracted all over again, for entirely different reasons, when Goro moves and starts to sit up, grimacing and wincing in a way that makes it clear that his back is extremely sore and stiff.

Which is understandable, given the awkward position he was lying in.

That's not the thing that really grabbed Ren's attention, though, no — it's the fact that he can now see just how much Goro looks like he's been dragged backwards through a hedge. His normally perfectly tousled hair is in complete disarray, the back of it frizzy and standing up and out at odd angles. It might be even messier than the time Ren 'disguised' him to avoid his fans at that café in Kichijoji.

It's equal parts adorable and hilarious, and Ren sends a longing glance in the direction of his phone. Although he supposes there's not much point in taking pictures that he probably wouldn't survive long enough to actually appreciate.

Goro must have noticed him looking, because he makes a sour face and reaches up to pat self-consciously at the back of his head.

"Make yourself useful and find me a brush or a comb, would you?" He still manages to sound all haughty and superior, despite his obvious embarrassment and extreme fluffiness. Looking Ren up and down, he levels a pointed glare at the general area above his forehead. "Assuming, of course, that you actually own one?"

Wow. Rude.

"I'll have you know…" Ren mimics Goro's prissy tone as he scoots backwards up the bed (trying to ignore the way it makes his neglected boner bounce distractingly as he goes), and reaches out to blindly fish for his comb in the depths of his shelving unit. "That I make sure to comb my hair on at least a bimonthly basis."

It only takes a couple of seconds of rummaging before his fingers bump against the comb. Ren pulls it free with a little flourish (spinning it, like he would a dagger) that makes Goro roll his eyes, and hands it over.

The look on Goro's face changes from withering to horrified as he accepts it. No surprise there. The comb is a bright, obnoxious orange and has a grinning Pyro Jack on the handle (one of the many pieces of 'loot' he'd ended up with after his latest trip to Akihabara with Futaba.) It's also already missing about a quarter of its teeth, which is just an occupational hazard when you've got hair as thick and unruly as Ren does.

"Why are you like this?" Goro asks despairingly, holding the comb disdainfully between his thumb and forefinger.

"It's part of my boyish charm."

"Hmm, if you say so." It's said with a derisive little snort as Goro relents and starts running the comb through his hair, diligently (and kind of aggressively) brushing the fluff into submission. Ren can't help but notice, again, the way that Goro grimaces when he has to extend his arm to get a good angle.

That weird sleeping position must have really done a number on him.

"You know," Ren says, once Goro's finished and has set the comb aside, onto the windowsill. "I give pretty decent massages — might help with all that stiffness you've got going on."

Wow, uh, he really wasn't trying to sneak a double entendre in there, but Ren figures that these things are bound to happen when there's a not-insubstantial amount of his blood in his dick rather than his brain. All those thoughts about how they're supposed to talk about things before getting handsy again seem to have conveniently slipped his mind.

Covering his mouth with the back of his hand, Goro makes a sound that's somewhere between a cough and a laugh. "How subtle of you."

"Seriously, it'll help." Ren hops up, maybe a little too eagerly, off the bed to make room. "Come on. Shirt off, and lie face down on the bed."

Goro's eyes linger blatantly on the tent in the front of Ren's pants for a handful of hungry seconds before he shrugs and pulls his t-shirt over his head. Taking it off in one of those one-armed, from the bottom manoeuvres (one that gets a bit spoiled by another pained wince), he lies down, flat on his stomach, and folds his arms under his chin.

"Good boy," Ren coos, and then laughs when Goro moves just enough to lift one hand and give him the finger. He doesn't miss the way that Goro's one visible ear has suddenly gone very pink, though, and he files that information away for later.

Despite being on the receiving end of massages here semi-regularly, Ren hasn't got any oils or anything like that, because that would probably just make the back rubs he gets from Kawakami-sensei even more weird and awkward than they already are. He figures that the big bottle of lotion that he has beside his bed will work well enough though, and he warms three generous pumps of it between his palms, before clambering back onto the bed and straddling Goro's lower back.

And it is a very nice back, covered in smooth, unblemished skin and toned in all the right places. Ren knows, from experience, that all the hard physical work they do in the Metaverse never translates into any real-world gains — which kind of sucks, but it's also probably why the injuries they get there don't persist in reality either, so he's not really complaining.

He has a vague memory of a conversation in the back of the Mona-bus between Goro and Haru about bouldering, and, he supposes, that's just the kind of hobby that would explain all the muscle definition that would definitely seem otherwise out of place on a busy honour student. Not that Ren can figure out how Goro actually fit it into his schedule alongside his work with the SIU, school, running a blog about eating his own weight in sweets, TV spots, Metaverse runs, and dying twice.

No wonder his shoulders are so stiff.

Spending a few seconds just smoothing the lotion over the planes of Goro's back in firm, broad strokes, Ren can't quite stop the snicker that comes up when even something that simple makes Goro nearly turn into a puddle beneath him.

The laughter makes Goro tense up again almost immediately, and he starts to move — probably about to respond with something shitty (or, maybe, even gearing up to push him off and getting up altogether), but Ren's way ahead of him. Digging his thumb into a knot under Goro's shoulder blade, he eases it out with probably a little more force than is strictly necessary, and watches Goro deflate again, complete with a low and satisfied hiss of air between his teeth.

"Good?" Ren teases, and he knows the laughter is still clear in his voice, but this time all he gets is a slightly dazed groan in return.

As tasks go, it's one that's very easy to become absorbed in. Ren is so focused on kneading away the tension in the boy beneath him (like he's an overgrown cat making biscuits) that he kind of loses track of how long he's actually been doing it. By the time his hands and wrists get tired, Goro is nearly fused to the mattress.

And, with how deep and even his breathing has gone, Ren could probably be forgiven for thinking that Goro has actually fallen back asleep. But when he brushes the soft hair at the nape of Goro's neck aside, and leans forward to place a kiss on the flushed skin there, Goro surprises him by twisting in place — just enough to bring their lips together. Ren parts his with a sigh as Goro slides his tongue into his mouth. Already, it feels like there are literal sparks dancing under his skin, and he's back to full hardness so quickly it almost makes him dizzy.

The same easy chemistry that lets them fight so well together in the Metaverse comes into play when Ren raises himself up slightly and Goro takes the cue to turn over. Bringing his hands to Ren's hips, Goro pulls him right back down to grind their hips together, all in one smooth movement that barely even breaks the kiss.

It feels so different from last night. The first kiss they shared had been sharp, all pent-up aggression and desperation, with lots of teeth. But this? It's softer, sure, but no less hungry for it — with a hand in his hair, manicured nails scratching pleasantly against his scalp, and the slow, deep slide of Goro's tongue against his.

Chuckling breathlessly, Goro pulls back a little, and presses a hand to Ren's chest to keep him in place when he tries to chase after him. It's a great laugh. Ren thinks he could listen to it forever.

"I'm going to assume that Sakura-san is downstairs?"

"Huh?" Ren manages, very eloquently, and Goro laughs at him again.

"Oh, I was just wondering about how easily sound travels between this attic and the café..." Goro brings a hand to his chin, framing it coquettishly with his thumb and forefinger, and when he speaks again, it comes out sweet and unassuming. "For example, hypothetically speaking, do you think we would be overheard if I were to, say, fuck you right into this pathetic excuse for a bed?"

Ren groans, dropping his forehead down to bump against Goro's, as his dick throbs almost painfully. "Holy shit..."

Honestly? He's never put any real thought into the idea of having a dick in his ass before. It's always been the other way around in his fantasies (especially the ones about Goro, because, come on, his ass is insane), but now that it's out there… Ren's surprised by just how hot it gets him.

As for how well sound carries down to the café…? If Sojiro had needed to find a calling card to figure out that they were the Phantom Thieves when Ryuji had been literally yelling about it up here for months, then they should probably be okay as long as they at least try to be quiet.

And it's not like Sojiro ever really comes up here, anyway. Not without hollering first.

Is he maybe thinking more with his dick than he should be?

Probably.

Is he too horny to care?

Oh, most definitely.

There is one potential problem, though.

"I don't have any lube… other than that…" He tips his chin towards the bottle of lotion on the shelf beside them. "And I, uh — I don't know if it'll do the job."

Sure, it works great for jerking off… but he's very out of his depth here, and he doesn't even want to think about trying to do it with just spit, either. Or dry… Yeah, nope. No thank you.

"Ah, well, if memory serves," Goro starts, pushing at Ren until he can wriggle out from under him. "I think we may be in luck."

Ren flops down onto the bed and watches, totally confused, as Goro reaches into the shelving unit and pulls his school blazer off the top of his neatly folded pile of clothes.

"Do you seriously just carry lube around with you?"

"No, of course not." Goro makes an annoyed tutting sound with his tongue to really show just how little he thinks of Ren's question. "However, I was at the TV studio just before I entered the Metaverse for the last time in December—" The fact that it was to go after Ren and the other Thieves goes unmentioned, which is good, because that would be kind of a mood-killer. "And one of the women in Makeup gave me this when I mentioned that my lips were dry."

He pulls a purple, palm-sized pot of something out of his blazer pocket, and Ren isn't quite convinced. Although he does like that it has a smiley, round, brown mascot on the lid.

"It's coconut oil," Goro explains (oh, the mascot is supposed to be a coconut — that's cute), and he must notice Ren's slightly sceptical look because he feels the need to add: "It's food-grade and perfectly safe, I assure you."

Ren is going to say something about how it's his ass that's going to be feeling it if it isn't 'perfectly safe', but then Goro sets the pot aside (but still well within reach of the bed), and starts getting the rest of the way undressed, and Ren very quickly becomes very distracted.

Goro steps out of the sweatpants quickly and with no real fanfare, but he makes a show out of removing his underwear, hooking his thumbs in the waistband and pulling the fabric down in an agonisingly slow drag — revealing the defined 'vee' of muscle that outlines his hips and a glimpse of hair the same colour as the cinnamon stored in the jars downstairs.

Wide-eyed, Ren watches as Goro's dick strains against the elastic waistband of his briefs for a couple of suspenseful seconds before it springs free to bounce back against his toned stomach. It's flushed and thick and ridiculously perfect, just like the rest of him, and Ren's mouth waters just looking at the pre-cum he can see glistening at the tip.

As funny as it would be for their rivalry to result in a literal dick-measuring contest, they haven't exactly had the opportunity to properly, uh, compare… Still, though, Ren can tell that they're around the same size. The thing is, even so, there's something about knowing that it's supposed to, somehow, fit inside of him that makes Goro's dick look intimidatingly massive.

It has Ren almost vibrating with that weird mixture of anxiety and anticipation that he usually only feels when his back is to the wall in the Metaverse, adrenaline coursing through his veins and heartbeat thundering in his ears.

"Clothes off," Goro says, doing that thing with his voice where it drops an octave, no Detective Prince left at all. Ren's dick twitches in appreciation. "Now."

Pulling his sweatshirt and pants off so fast that it would probably be funny under other circumstances, Ren realises, as he balls up his clothes and throws them aside, that Goro is staring at him with his mouth slightly open — completely mesmerised, his cocky act forgotten for the moment. Oh, right, Goro didn't actually get to see his dick last night, did he? Despite giving him the best handjob of his life.

Maybe Goro needs to be reminded that he's not the only one who likes to put on a show.

Ren can feel the smirk creep across his face as he slides his hand slowly down his stomach to loosely grip his erection, before running his fingers from base to tip, feather-light and just enough to make him shiver.

Eyes following every movement of his hand, Goro swallows audibly, his Adam's apple bobbing.

"What's the matter, Go-ro? Cat got your tongue?"

Goro's eyes jerk back up to his, looking, for a second, like a kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar, before he composes himself again, his expression going back to something smugly confident. Crossing the space between them, he climbs back onto the bed and pushes roughly at Ren's chest again (something that would be annoying if he wasn't also kind of into it), until he's flat on his back and Goro is kneeling between his thighs.

The morning light that streams in through the window beside them brings out the red in Goro's irises and makes any flyaway hairs around the crown of his head glow like a halo. He's almost painfully beautiful as he reaches out to place a warm hand on Ren's chest, right over his pounding heart.

"Promise me that you won't be a self-sacrificing moron about this, Ren."

Oh.

He was not prepared for Goro to be so openly concerned for his well-being. It's really cute, and that maybe-love feeling wells up inside him again. Of course, he deals with it by saying the first dumb thing that pops into his head.

"The only sword I plan to fall on, Goro, is yours."

The corner of Goro's mouth twitches, and he makes a small (begrudgingly amused) noise in the back of his throat before leaning down to press a kiss to Ren's collarbone.

"I don't think that phrase is actually appropriate in this context, but I'll give you points for the wordplay, I suppose."

"Wow, so generous — Ah!" It's hard to concentrate on being sassy when Goro is kissing his way down his chest, and pretty much impossible when he takes a detour to bite lightly at his nipple.

And he keeps going — down his stomach, and along his hipbone — maddeningly close to his achingly hard dick, until he's propped up on his elbows between Ren's legs. Goro kisses the inside of his right thigh as he hitches it up over his shoulder, and Ren suddenly finds himself feeling very exposed. His pulse kicks into overdrive as he hears the sound of the metal lid of the little pot being unscrewed.

Closing his eyes as the pleasantly sweet smell of coconuts floods the air — along with the soft, wet sound of Goro warming the oil in his hands — Ren tries his best to stay calm.

And then braces himself for the intrusion.

Well-oiled fingers close into a fist around his dick instead, pumping up and down in a deliciously slick slide that shocks a broken sound out of him. Some embarrassing hybrid of a yelp and a moan.

Holy shit, that is — wow — that is a very effective distraction. Leaving his thoughts almost as slippery as the hand expertly jerking him off. Ren hardly tenses at all when he feels one of the fingers from Goro's other hand sliding lower, even when it dips in between his cheeks and circles the sensitive ring of muscle there before pressing in gently.

And oh, that feels… weird?

Not bad, though, and (if he doesn't think about it too closely) maybe even kind of good? Although Ren thinks that probably has more to do with how Goro is pulling so nicely on his dick than anything else.

Pushing himself up onto his elbows to get a better view, Ren finds himself flushing immediately in embarrassed arousal when he sees the way that Goro is watching his finger sink into his body with open and hungry fascination.

Their eyes meet, and Goro holds his gaze as he leans the short distance forward to run his tongue in a broad, flat stroke up the length of his dick. Groaning, Ren's hips twitch upwards in a shallow, reflexive movement that smears the head of his dick across one of Goro's perfect cheekbones, leaving a shiny wet trail of pre-cum and oil there.

Oh man, that's hot.

Still watching him from under hooded eyelids, Goro sinks his mouth down over him, and it's so insanely good that Ren collapses back down onto the bed with another rattly groan. So caught up in the feel of that hot, wet mouth around him that he almost doesn't register it when a second finger joins the one already in his ass.

There's a bit of a stretch now, a burn — even more so when Goro twists and hooks his fingers. And maybe it says something about Ren that it kind of feels better to him now that there's an edge of pain to go along with the weird, invasive feeling.

It's almost overwhelming, being caught between two points of extreme sensation as he rolls his hips to thrust up into Goro's mouth and gets skewered on his fingers on the way down.

Reaching out without thinking, Ren sinks his hands into Goro's hair, and gasps at the way it makes him moan around his dick. Shit, he's so close, the pleasure twisting low in his gut is building and building, making the muscles in his stomach and his legs twitch and tremble.

"Goro — Ah — I'm gonna—!"

And Goro does something with his fingers at the same time that he sucks hard, and Ren could almost swear that he actually blacks out for a second when he comes. Only just keeping it together enough to remember to slap a hand over his mouth, smothering the cry that feels like it's being wrenched from his throat.

Breathless and still shaking, it takes Ren a long, long moment to find his voice again. "Wow… that was… wow."

Still between his legs, Goro chuckles, and his voice is dark and rough from sucking dick. The sound of it does even more funny things to Ren's insides.

Goro slips his fingers free (and for some reason, not having something in his ass is the thing that feels weird now), and moves back up the bed — leaning down to press a wet and open-mouthed kiss against his lips. They make out like that for a while, sloppy and lazy, full of the strange (but not unpleasant) taste of cum and coconuts.

The dick pressed right up against his hip bone is an insistent reminder that they've only gotten started, though. Goro pulls back just enough to whisper, "Are you ready?"

Ren feels heavy, relaxed and completely boneless in the afterglow of such an insanely good orgasm. And even though there is still trepidation bubbling somewhere in his stomach, he knows that he wants it. He wants Goro inside of him.

"Yeah, I'm ready. Let's do this."

Goro searches his expression for a second, probably until he's satisfied that Ren isn't bullshitting him, before he exhales shakily, pushes himself up, and moves back down the bed again. He needs to rock back on his heels to retrieve the little pot, and Ren watches, rapt, as he melts the oil in his hands carefully, and then slicks himself with three fast pumps of his fist that make his eyelids flutter prettily.

Ren lifts a slightly wobbly leg to hook it over Goro's shoulder — figuring that it'll (probably) give him a better angle — and holds his breath as Goro lines himself up, rubbing the head of his dick over Ren's hole before he starts to slowly press inside.

And it's probably the single strangest thing Ren has ever felt, but wow, there's something undeniably hot about being bent almost in half as inch after inch of cock slides into him. Until Goro's hips are flush against his ass, and he's looming over him, colour high in his cheeks, breath coming out in harsh pants while his hair hangs down around his face.

"Ren…" Goro whispers, voice cracking a little around his name.

They're both shaking as Ren brings his hands up to cup Goro's face, and as he stares up into those warm, brown eyes, it's like a current passes between them. Ren feels so incredibly full, and it still feels really weird, but it's also satisfying... like they're blurring... or like he's being consumed from the inside out.

"You can move," Ren says softly and between small tender kisses peppered along Goro's jawline.

Not needing to be told twice, Goro nods shakily, biting his lip as he pulls out slowly, almost completely, before sinking back in and — oh! Ren feels a strangely pleasurable jolt as Goro's dick drags against the spot that he found with his fingers earlier.

Yeah, okay. He can definitely get on board with that.

And his dick apparently agrees because he can feel that he's half-hard again already and only getting harder with each roll of Goro's hips.

Handsome face feverishly pink and sweaty, Goro is a beautiful wreck above him, pupils blown wide and bottom lip white between his teeth as he struggles to keep quiet. Ren reaches up to grab him by the back of the neck, twisting his fingers in the long hair there, and pulls him down into a rough and desperate kiss. Swallowing Goro's grunts and moans as the slide of the tongue in his mouth echoes the thrust into his body.

Goro's rhythm is smooth, controlled, right up until it isn't — becoming more and more erratic as he gets a trembling hand between them to grasp Ren's dick in a still-slick fist, pumping him quickly and sloppily in time with his thrusts. Back arching at the sensation, Ren breaks their kiss with a strangled gasp. Still oversensitive, it's nearly too much — he almost can't believe it when he starts to feel his second orgasm building so soon after the first.

"Goro... Ah-ah..." Ren pants, as quietly as he can, into the half-inch of space between them, his words coming out between shaky gasps, "You feel so good… I'm gonna come…!"

And Goro growls, deep in his chest, and starts jerking him faster until Ren sees actual stars, spilling over Goro's fist and all over himself — and holy shit, he can feel his ass clenching around the cock pumping in and out of him. It's probably the hottest thing that he's ever experienced, and he realises dimly that he's babbling in a hoarse whisper.

"Come inside me… please — oh! — Goro… fill me up…"

Hips snapping forward, Goro buries himself deep as he comes, eyes rolling back into his head as he groans and shakes with the force of it.

Both trembling and gasping for breath, they share another kiss as the aftershocks shudder through them, Goro nearly collapsing on top of him. Once they start to come down, though, it becomes pretty obvious that they're not in a sustainable or comfortable position. They separate slowly and gingerly, and Ren winces at the weird empty feeling when Goro slips out of him, wrinkling his nose at the trickle of cum that follows.

Reaching out to grab the box of tissues on the shelf without looking, Ren pulls out a fistful and offers them to Goro, who sits up and takes them with a quiet 'thank you' before he sets about wiping his hands. Ren cleans up the mess that's on his stomach as best he can with some more of the tissues and then dabs at the inside of his thigh when he feels another dribble of cum there.

There's something fragile in the air — in the way Goro is hiding behind the curtain of his hair as he makes a show of inspecting his nails — and Ren acts mostly on instinct when he reaches out to pull him close. Coaxing him back into lying down and catching his chin like he did last night to force eye contact.

Goro's expression is open and vulnerable, uncharacteristically so, but while his eyes are misty, he's not crying this time. That has to be a step in the right direction, right?

"That was amazing, Goro — you were amazing," Ren whispers emphatically, and he watches as Goro flushes predictably at the praise.

"Ren, I…" he starts and then stops, snapping his mouth shut against the wobble in his voice, his soft expression twisting into a scowl.

"Hey," Ren soothes, pulling him in close again so that he can tuck Goro's head under his chin. "It's okay."

Goro sighs deeply, frustrated. "I hate feeling weak like this — hate that I'm reduced to a pathetic blubbering mess by something so fucking simple!"

"It's okay," Ren repeats, because what else can he say? He brings a hand up to run his fingers through Goro's hair, firm but gentle, and it takes a while, but the tension seems to drain out of him with each stroke.

Is Goro just one of those people who cry after sex? That's a thing, right? Or is there something else going on? Ren doesn't think that it's the kind of question that you can just come out and ask.

So they just stay like that for a while, slotted together like puzzle pieces. It's very warm and dangerously comfortable, and Ren feels himself drift in and out of sleep more than once before his stomach decides to announce, very loudly, that it's empty and not at all happy about it.

Goro snorts a sleepy laugh into his collarbone, and he sounds more like his normal self when he asks, "Hungry?"

"Ugh, sorry." Ren reaches out to grab his phone off the windowsill, awkwardly trying to unplug it one-handed. "I just realised that I don't even know what time it is."

He lifts his phone up into the air above his face (the lock-screen helpfully informs him that it's 10:47, which isn't actually that bad, all things considered), and Goro turns — obviously trying to get a look at his screen. Which, honestly, is kind of rude, but Ren quickly realises exactly what it is that Goro is trying to see when he notices the flood of notifications in their old group chat.

"What did you do?" Ren laughs.

"I think that Futaba Sakura referred to it as 'top tier trolling,'" Goro replies, sounding very pleased with himself.

Chapter Text

Goro is ready for it this time.

Ready for the sorrow that rushes in, like water into the lungs of the drowning, greedily filling the vacuum left by the last few pleasant twinges of his orgasm. His ribcage feels several sizes too small, and there's a lump in his throat that threatens to choke him as he and Ren pull apart to clean up. The distance between them, as he dutifully wipes the oil off his hands, feels like a yawning chasm he can't cross — as if they're only tethered together by something frayed and tenuous.

It's nearly unbearable.

But he's got it under control.

More or less.

The Phantom Thieves would probably be surprised at best (and call him a liar at worst) if he told them that he has always considered himself to be very good at regulating his emotions, or, at the very least, that he's able to contain them until he can find somewhere sufficiently private to blow off some steam. Their opinions would obviously be coloured by witnessing his (not insubstantial) breakdown in Shido's Palace. But that had been one of the single lowest moments in his entire life, surpassed only by two others: what happened on the twentieth of November (not that he'd have admitted it at the time), and, years ago, when he came rushing home, full of stories about his first day of middle school, only to find his mother, still tucked into her futon, cold, lifeless, and with the empty pill bottle still clutched in her hand.

And really, who wouldn't react… poorly to finding out that the last true obstacle standing between you and your imminent revenge — the boy who you'd yet to realise you were hopelessly in love with — had, somehow, survived you shooting him in the head? Then, of course, had come the cherry on top: being soundly trounced by that very same boy and his band of merry thieves when you tried your best to rectify that little discrepancy.

So, yes, he hadn't exactly been in top form, mentally speaking, in that engine room, but under more normal circumstances (not that any of this could be called remotely normal), he's usually more than capable of keeping his unsavoury emotions in check. Getting close to Shido and his gaggle of sycophants was something he'd never have been able to achieve if he wasn't a grade A bullshitter, after all.

And now, he might be feeling as if he's being crushed from the inside out, but that doesn't matter. The important thing is that he's keeping it mostly to himself this time. Goro thinks he's doing an acceptable job of it too, that is — until Ren reaches out to him again, as if it's nothing, and pulls him close, whispering sweet affirmations in his ear.

Almost overwhelmed by a wave of... something — some nauseating mixture of affection and anguish, perhaps — Goro opens his mouth to speak without thinking.

"Ren, I…" and the rest of the words die on his tongue when he hears how small and pitifully weak his voice sounds.

He's not even entirely sure what it was that he was going to say anyway, only that there seems to be an equal chance of it being one of several exceedingly stupid and mortifying options: 'thank you', perhaps, or 'I'm sorry', or worst of all, 'I love you'.

And, of course, Ren's first impulse when Goro is being pathetic is to draw him even closer and try to reassure him. Turbulent as his emotional state currently is, Goro can't quite tell if it's just the thing he needs or the exact opposite.

His (already tenuous) control is faltering; he can almost feel it slipping through his grasp — the only thing that saves his dignity is the fact that, tucked in against Ren's collarbone, he at least has a modicum of privacy. If Ren feels the handful of tears that still manage to escape from the corners of his burning eyes, he has enough tact not to comment on it.

"I hate feeling weak like this," Goro hisses bitterly. "Hate that I'm reduced to a pathetic blubbering mess by something so fucking simple!"

Ren just strokes his hair and soothes him with more meaningless platitudes, and it shouldn't work, but it does. Goro feels himself relax slowly, begrudgingly, until he drifts into the muggy place between true sleep and wakefulness.

Perhaps he can blame the steady rise and fall of Ren's chest under his cheek, or the soothing, repetitive sound of the heart beating within. It's almost hypnotic, like the ebb and flow of the tide. Eroding away the sharp edges of Goro's nerves until he feels pleasantly numb.

They stay there for... he couldn't say for how long, but it's enough that, when he's jolted awake by the loud gurgle of Ren's stomach, his mood has, genuinely, picked back up, and the amusement in his voice is sincere when he asks, "Hungry?"

Ren laughs sleepily, apologises, and then reaches for his phone, mumbling something about checking the time. Goro wakes the rest of the way up as the screen comes into view.

There are quite a lot of notifications.

"What did you do?" Ren laughs.

"I think that Futaba Sakura referred to it as 'top tier trolling'."

Shifting against Ren's side, Goro pulls the blanket up over them a little more and then turns, just enough, so that he can comfortably watch Ren unlock his phone and open the group chat from November.

And, even though his spirits have been (somewhat) lifted, he still manages, somehow, to feel slighted when he sees that he's still registered as 'Akechi' in Ren's phone — which is something he knows is irrational and downright moronic. It's not as if Ren has had an opportunity to change it in the short time since he's started referring to him as 'Goro'.

Still, seeing his surname listed alongside the given names of the others makes him tighten his grip, where his arm is draped across Ren's midsection — in what Ren probably assumes is affection, but is almost entirely coming from a place of petty, possessive jealousy.

-Casino Heist 🃏 Jokers are Wild-
19/03/2017
5:43 a.m.

Akechi: Thank you.

6:32 a.m.

Ryuji: dude
Ryuji: dude!!!
Ryuji: is our chat freakin haunted

Futaba: oh noes!
＼(º □ º |||)/

Makoto: I wouldn't jump to any conclusions just yet, Ryuji.
Makoto: I'm sure that it's just some kind of network issue. The text could have been sent from Akechi-kun's phone in December, but perhaps it's only being delivered now?
Makoto: Futaba?

Futaba: nope it was def sent this morning

"She's such a little turd," Ren laughs, making a stupid snorting noise that has no business being as cute as it is, and Goro smiles despite himself.

Ryuji: what the eff man

Makoto: Well, that is slightly concerning.
Makoto: Akechi-kun? If you're still there, could you please explain what's happening? Are you lying low somewhere?

Ryuji: yeah
Ryuji: that makes sense
Ryuji: hes prolly just hiding out
Ryuji: not a ghost
Ryuji: or whatever

Yusuke: I actually saw Akechi's message when it first came through.
Yusuke: I was painting the sunrise at the time, despite the fact that I would normally consider it far too pedestrian a subject to commit to canvas.
Yusuke: However, I had the most vivid dream last night! It was Akechi, bathed in the exquisite, ethereal, crimson glow of Tokyo's dawn! The image was so arresting and commanding that I'm afraid that I forgot to eat breakfast in my rush to bring it to life, and I ended up feeling quite light-headed as a direct consequence. Truthfully, in my addled state, I believed that the text was my subconscious playing a trick on me by making it seem as if my muse was trying to contact me directly.

Futaba: holy wall of text Inari

Yusuke: It shall be titled "Drowning in Flames", and should be completed within the week. I look forward to sharing it with all of you.

"What on earth does that mean?" Goro asks, slightly distressed.

"Oh, that's just Yusuke." Ren seems unconcerned, so much so that he doesn't even look away from the phone. "One time, I showed him a picture of a pile of fluffy kittens, and he was inspired to paint something called 'The Staircase of Despair'."

"Is that so…?" Goro murmurs, as if he understands.

Ryuji: bro
Ryuji: that sounds intense af
Ryuji: but its weird
Ryuji: i had a dream bout Akechi last nite too
Ryuji: kinda
Ryuji: I guess it was bout all of us really
Ryuji: fightin in mementos

Makoto: Now that you mention it, I think I did as well?
Makoto: Although it's still hazy… I dreamt that we were all gathered together in Leblanc.
Makoto: I'm almost positive that Akechi-kun was there too.

Goro frowns. This is becoming... strange, and only becoming stranger by the second, quickly veering in a direction that is the exact opposite of what he had been hoping for when he sent his reply to the chat. The Phantom Thieves were the ones who were supposed to be unsettled here, not him.

"Okay, what the hell?" Ren huffs a little disbelieving laugh, pulling Goro back out of his thoughts. "I didn't have a dream about you last night — unless you count the Velvet Room — but I had been thinking about you just before I fell asleep…" He trails off as he looks back to the chat log, obviously distracted by what he sees there, and when Goro follows his gaze, he feels an eerie and uncomfortable prickle dance its way up his spine.

Futaba: uh
Futaba: i wasnt asleep but i was thinking about Akechi last night too
Futaba: like his stupid face hijacked my brain when I was trying to think about other stuff

Ann: you guys 😴
Ann: my phone nearly vibrated off my night stand
Ann: give me a sec to read back over everything

Futaba: Mona says he had an Akechi dream too
Futaba: hes bein weird tho
Futaba: wont tell me what it was about…

Ann: Akechi is alive?!!!
Ann: is Ren awake?
Ann: has he seen this?

Futaba: i was gonna keep the joke going
Futaba: but this is getting too freaky deaky
Σ(°△°|||)︴
Futaba: Akechi respawned in Leblanc last night
Futaba: Mona says that Ren said it had something to do with the velvet room
Futaba: so Ren knows that hes back
Futaba: obvi
Futaba: Mona also says that theres no way that Ren is awake this early w/o him bein there to wake him up

Ann: That's true! 😂
Ann: it's so crazy that Akechi is actually back!
Ann: I'm super happy for Ren! ✨
Ann: and I totally had an Akechi dream too!
Ann: we were eating crêpes in Kichijoji
Ann: maybe I should invite him to go get some now that he's back?

Futaba: Ann even dreams about sweets
(´ ω `♡)

Ann: Yep! 💖

Yusuke: I may need to incorporate the theme of resurrection into my latest piece.
Yusuke: Yes! I can see it now! Crow wings painted cinnabar by the sun! Evocative of the phoenix rising from the ashes!

Ann: he's off again 😅

Ryuji: wait
Ryuji: Futaba r u ok?
Ryuji: nd what about Haru?
Ryuji: is she gonna be ok if she sees this

Makoto: I was just thinking the same thing, Ryuji.

Futaba: meh im fine
Futaba: or i will be
Futaba: but when it comes to Haru im way ahead of you
Futaba: i made it so she cant open anything on her phone until she reads the message i sent her first
Futaba: a heads up
Futaba: didnt want her to see a text from Akechi with no warning

The arm that Ren has around him tightens a little, and while Goro appreciates the show of solidarity, he can't exactly blame Haru Okumura for potentially needing some time to adjust to the idea that her father's killer is back.

Again.

Honestly, it's almost a relief. He's still having a hard time understanding why Futaba Sakura has been so blasé about the whole thing.

Yusuke: That was surprisingly considerate of you, Futaba.

Futaba: shut it Inari!
( ￣ω￣)ノﾞ⌒☆ﾐ(o _ _)o

Yusuke: I'm afraid that I don't know what that sequence of symbols is supposed to represent…

Futaba: ୧((#Φ益Φ#))୨

Yusuke: That is clearer. Marginally.

Makoto: Thank you, Futaba.
Makoto: For thinking of Haru's feelings.
Makoto: Also, I may have an idea about what happened, re the Akechi situation.

Ryuji: thats our queen!
Ryuji: hella smart!

Futaba: (눈_눈)

Ryuji: what the hells that sposed to mean?

Futaba: nothing!
ε=ε=ε=ε=┌(;￣▽￣)┘

Makoto: Yes, well. Setting that aside.
Makoto: Morgana said that Akechi-kun's return was related to the Velvet Room.
Makoto: And Ren has mentioned before that he sometimes goes there while he's sleeping.
Makoto: So, it might be safe to say that it has some connection to people's dreams, as well as to the Metaverse.
Makoto: Perhaps he was brought back using a form of actualisation?

Ann: I don't really understand... but if Makoto said it then it probably makes sense? 🤔

Futaba: she means that Lavenza
Futaba: or whoever
Futaba: used our dreams or thoughts as like a cognitive battery
Futaba: like how we got that buff in the yaldy fight when all the npcs started believing in us again

Niijima's hypothesis is sound, Goro will give her that, but Sakura…

Assuming that 'yaldy' is her way of referring to Yaldabaoth, Goro also knows that 'buff' is some nonsense video game term — one that he's heard her use, many times, to describe empowering spells in the Metaverse, like Sukukaja or Heat Riser.

He can't make sense of that last part, though.

"When who started believing in you again?"

"She's talking about what happened at the end of our fight with Yaldabaoth; we were winning, but it turns out that gods are kind of sore losers, I guess? So it tried to erase us again — but everyone in Tokyo rallied behind us and brought us back," Ren explains, with a small shrug that jostles Goro's head uncomfortably. "It also let me summon this huge Persona — like Skytree huge, it was pretty cool."

"Hang on-" Goro twists, just enough, in Ren's grip to glare up at him. "It never occurred to you, in your infinite wisdom, to use this 'huge Persona' when we were — oh, I don't know, actually fighting for our lives and freedom against Maruki and Adam Kadmon?!"

Ren laughs and holds his hands up in a way that's obviously intended to come across as appeasing, but just results in him nearly dropping his phone instead — he saves it, at the last second, and celebrates (like the flashy asshole that he is) by spinning it on his fucking finger.

Goro's eyes nearly roll out of his skull.

"C'mon, don't look at me like that! I can still summon Satanael, but he's not anywhere near that big now — I guess it was just a onetime thing…? Maybe?" Ren shrugs again. Goro grits his teeth and (somehow) resists the urge to headbutt him. "It had something to do with the power of the public's belief in us, like in a cheesy anime… So, uh, maybe Igor did something similar, on a smaller scale, for you?"

After mulling over the idea for a second, Goro has to admit that there is a certain logic to it. If his bond with Ren was the thing that sustained and protected him in the limbo that was the Velvet Room, then it follows that there would be power in his other… relationships, no matter how paltry they might be.

Ren pulls him in close again, back under his chin, and Goro goes without too much of a fight — still thinking about the specifics behind his return, and the involvement of the others in it.

"You good to keep reading?" Ren whispers fondly into the crown of his head, and he feels Ren nose through his hair to place a soft kiss in his parting.

Goro sighs and hums an affirmative, wondering if he'll ever feel worthy of such freely given affection, before he looks back to the screen.

Makoto: Thank you, Futaba.

Futaba: np
(￣^￣)ゞ

Yusuke: Ah, that does make sense.

Ann: I'm just gonna smile and nod 😅

Ryuji: i think i get it
Ryuji: kinda
Ryuji: but like
Ryuji: Akechi just appeared in leblanc right?
Ryuji: is Ren ok?

Futaba: ∠( ᐛ 」∠)_

Ryuji: huh?

Futaba: Ren is fine
(￢‿￢ )

Makoto: That's a relief.

"What exactly do they think I would have done to you?" Goro peers back up at Ren, incredulous. "Wait, actually, more importantly, how and why does Sakura know how 'fine' you are?"

Goro had assumed, when she reached out to him last night (or this morning, more accurately), that she knew he was in Leblanc simply because he'd turned his phone on, or potentially because that stupid fucking cat had been unable to keep its big mouth shut. There is another possibility occurring to him now, however, and to say that he's not exactly happy about it would be an understatement.

"I mean, I get why they might be worried..." Ren says thoughtfully, before he flutters his eyelashes and adopts a supremely ridiculous faux-innocent tone. "You did steal into my room in the middle of the night, after all, and you just had your wicked way with me."

"Ren," Goro warns, caught somewhere between the desire to laugh at how ludicrous this all is, and the urge to smack Ren silly for the same reason, "how does Sakura know?"

Ren makes a sound in the back of his throat, non-committal and evasive.

So Goro slides a hand up his chest (noting the way that Ren tenses as fingers ghost over his ribs — clearly and obviously ticklish) and catches his nipple between his thumb and forefinger. The yelp that Ren lets out when he really twists is immensely gratifying.

"Ow! Jeez, okay! Futaba has bugs set up downstairs…" Ren wheezes a laugh, "Which I completely forgot about until after we came up here last night, I swear."

"Ugh…" Goro groans — his worst fears confirmed — as his mind replays all of the incredibly humiliating things that she almost certainly overheard. If he concentrates hard enough, perhaps the lumpy mattress will be merciful and swallow him whole.

If it does, he's taking Ren with him.

"Hey, it's not so bad," Ren says, and he doesn't sound embarrassed — not at all — the bastard! "I'm pretty sure she hasn't got any… uh, surveillance equipment up here, at least. So, how about we finish reading this, and then we can get some breakfast, okay?"

"Hmm, whatever," Goro mutters. Although he is starting to feel hungry (the smell of curry and coffee wafting up from the café downstairs is becoming hard to ignore), so he might be feeling slightly more eager than he's letting on.

He'll just have to hope that Sojiro Sakura will actually be willing to serve him, and not just chase him out into the street the second he lays eyes on him.

Ann: Oh, Ren is fine? 👀

Futaba: Ann gets me

Yusuke: What is there to get?

Ryuji: yeah im lost

Makoto: I'm not sure that I understand what you're referring to either.

Ann: It's not for us to say 😅

Goro opens his mouth to sneer something about how a significant number of Ren's friends are terminally oblivious, anything to take the focus off his own mortification, but then he notices the next reply and his jaw snaps shut again.

Haru: Good morning! 💕
Haru: Thank you, Futaba-chan, and everyone.
Haru: For worrying about me.
Haru: It was certainly a shock.
Haru: But maybe less of a shock than it might have been if this was the first time that Akechi-kun reappeared after we thought that he had died?

Futaba: thats fair

Haru: Of course, I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
Haru: But I am glad that Akechi-kun is alive, and I'm very happy for Ren-kun if he and Akechi-kun have finally "resolved their differences."
Haru: Especially since he's going home so soon.

Well, there it is.

The proverbial elephant in the room.

Having gone very still underneath him, Ren is holding his breath and obviously pretending that he's still looking at the screen, all while he's actually trying to watch Goro out of the corner of his eye. There's a strange kind of satisfaction to be found in the awkward silence that falls over them. It's entirely of Ren's own making, after all, and Goro is not going to be the one to break it. He's more than content to wait patiently until Ren finally clears his throat and speaks.

"You, uh, you don't seem surprised."

"Ren," Goro sighs, not even trying to keep the condescension out of his voice, "it can hardly be called a secret when you told me yourself — via text — already."

Looking confused for a moment before things obviously click into place, Ren suddenly seems to become particularly interested in the ceiling. And Goro is sure that if both of Ren's hands weren't currently occupied (holding a phone and Goro, respectively), that he'd probably be playing, self-consciously, with his bangs.

"Oh, right… Yeah... I sent you a bunch of stuff, huh?"

"Yes, you did," Goro replies, sweet and vindictive, "how very embarrassing for you."

Ren barks a laugh, and Goro feels his expression slip into something more genuine.

"You're such a dick." The way that Ren says it is sickeningly affectionate, as if he just called him a cutesy pet name instead of insulting him. "How did we ever think that you were nice?"

Goro thinks about how nauseatingly trusting Ren and the other Thieves are — how their faith in other people has remained undamaged despite everything they've been through — blissfully naïve in a way that Goro loathes but is, simultaneously, also immensely jealous of.

None of that feels appropriate to say, however, so he takes a page out of Ren's book and just shrugs the comment off, focusing instead on the more important matter of Ren going home.

"When are you leaving?"

Ren grimaces. "There's no school tomorrow — what with it being Shunbun no Hi and all… So, yeah… my folks figured it'd be the best day for it."

It's so soon.

It's too soon.

"I see…" Goro says, pushing himself up into a sitting position. Needing, all of a sudden, to put even the smallest amount of distance between them. Ren doesn't protest as he shrugs his arm off his shoulder, but Goro feels the way his hand tightens on his bicep for a second before he lets go, and it falls away.

Of course, it becomes immediately clear that attempting to get some space on this criminally tiny bed isn't exactly realistic. He ends up in a stupidly uncomfortable position, caught between Ren and the wall, with his legs drawn up to his chest, and his back pressed into the hard line of the windowsill.

Whatever.

It's still easier than trying to think about Ren going home while they're all cuddled up together.

Ugh, pathetic.

"I'm going to come back whenever I have the chance, you know?" Ren is speaking very gently, and Goro has to take a deep breath and let it back out slowly to prevent himself from becoming obviously annoyed at being treated like he's some kind of easily spooked animal. "And I've already started looking into colleges here... for, uh... for after I graduate."

None of that is particularly reassuring, though, is it?

Considering the fact that Goro has only one plan for the immediate future, and it doesn't involve waiting around for Ren like a lovesick puppy, or waiting for this fateful 'opportunity' that Theodore mentioned. No, Goro has decided that he's going to be contacting Sae to turn himself in, regardless, and fate can figure out the fucking details itself if it really wants him for something.

He's not sure how honest Shido has been about his involvement in the mental shutdown incidents, and the idea of going into hiding while he tries to find out, constantly looking over his shoulder, is… unpalatable, to say the least. There are too many unknowns — too much is still up in the air — and this feels like the only logical step forward.

And he'd be lying if he said that there isn't a certain cathartic appeal to the idea of coming clean about it all, in reality, instead of that strange not-interrogation he'd sat through in Maruki's distorted dream world at the start of the year.

He just would have liked to have had longer than a single day with Ren before he did it.

It's a thought that helps to put things in perspective, somewhat, and he realises just how much he really doesn't want to ruin what little time they have left by being a morose fucking idiot about it, so he decides to switch tactics.

"We can discuss the logistics as much as you like," he says, "but perhaps it would be best to wait until after we've gotten dressed and had something to eat, hmm?"

"I guess so, yeah…" Ren is watching him closely, clearly suspicious, and Goro has to wonder if he's given himself away somehow, or if Ren is just that infuriatingly intuitive.

"Was there anything else important in there?" Goro asks, tipping his chin towards the phone in Ren's hand, both out of genuine curiosity and as a distraction.

Ren blinks, and the intense glint disappears from his eyes, just like that, as he brings the phone back up to his face to start scrolling through the chat again quickly.

"Uh, they just say they're going to be coming here to meet up at half eleven… Which, uh, it's nearly five past now, so yeah — we should probably get up..." He trails off as he continues reading, and then snorts a laugh.

Against his better judgement, Goro asks, "What's so amusing?"

"Oh, it's just Futaba making fun of Ryuji for being up so early."

"I was surprised too, but I fail to see how it's funny?"

"Ryuji gets up at the crack of dawn pretty much every day to go running, you know?" Ren explains. "Sundays are different, though — he usually stays in bed. The thing is, he's kinda been gearing up to ask Makoto to go with him for a while, and, since they were the first ones to see your reply, I guess he finally did — only she must have wanted to do it this morning..."

"Ah…" Goro smiles in a way that he hopes comes across as sincere, because he could not possibly give any less of a shit about some Phantom Thief relationship drama, but he doesn't want to make that too obvious when he's literally only just resolved to not spoil their morning. "Good for them."

Although he supposes it is nice to know that at least two of them will be keeping their greedy little eyes on one another instead of on Ren.

"It's okay, Goro," Ren says, sounding amused, "you don't have to pretend to care."

"Oh, thank fuck."

Ren makes a small surprised sound, and then he's laughing, shoulders shaking and eyes already streaming — presumably with the effort of trying to do it quietly. Slightly baffled, Goro watches him splutter and wheeze, and is so genuinely surprised by the uncharacteristic outburst that he doesn't even have time to be offended by the fact that it's almost certainly at his expense.

"Wow, I don't think I'll ever get used to you talking like that…" Ren pauses to gulp down a lungful of air, and wipe at the corners of his eyes. "Do you have to flip a coin in your head? Where heads is 'thank fuck' and tails is 'thank goodness'?"

That last part is said in a soft, high-pitched (and, unfortunately, also annoyingly good) impression of his Detective Prince voice, and Goro feels the bewildered smile on his face go sharp at the edges. He reaches back to brace his hands against the windowsill behind him, plants one foot firmly against Ren's thigh, and then the other against his ribcage.

Eyes going wide with comprehension at the last second, Ren tries to sit up. Scrabbling at the sheets in a futile attempt to save himself, just as Goro shoves him off the bed.

He goes over the edge gracelessly, bringing the blanket with him, and hits the floor with a squawk and a satisfyingly loud thud.

Ren's still laughing.

Goro realises that he is too.

"Kid?" Sojiro Sakura's voice comes from the bottom of the stairs. He sounds mildly annoyed but also clearly concerned. "You okay up there?"

And Ren is up off the floor like a shot, scrambling to wrap himself up in the blanket as he hurries over to the edge of the stairwell. Obviously, he's worried that his guardian is going to come up to check on him, and Goro appreciates the quick reaction, given that he doesn't have the luxury of a blanket to preserve his modesty.

He's still unsure of how hospitable Sakura is going to be when he realises that Goro is in his café, but it seems fair to assume that finding him naked in the attic would be less than well-received.

"I'm fine, Boss!" Ren calls out, leaning over the bannister. "Be down in a few minutes!"

Getting up off the bed himself, Goro stretches, flexing and testing the muscles across his back that had been stiff and uncomfortable when he woke up this morning. There's still a minor twinge here and there, particularly when he rolls his shoulders, but Ren's massage really does seem to have worked wonders on him.

And he's all set to tell Ren just how much it's helped, when he realises he's being watched. The stretching really had been genuine, but he supposes that he can understand why it might have been interpreted as more flirtation.

"How are we ever supposed to get dressed…" Ren sounds slightly breathless as he crosses the room and gets right back into Goro's personal space. "When you look like that?"

Smirking back at him, Goro tugs at the blanket around Ren's waist until it falls away, and, all of a sudden, there's the very distracting slide of bare skin against bare skin again. His cock twitches hopefully at the contact, but they really can't afford to delay the inevitable any longer, particularly now, when Sakura is actively waiting for Ren.

"Because," he whispers, kissing Ren softly on the mouth, "your annoying friends will be here soon, and, as hilarious as I think it would be to witness how they'd react to finding their leader so thoroughly debauched, I'm sure you don't want them to see you like this."

"Good point," Ren admits, with a small chuckle, giving Goro's hips a squeeze before he pulls away to pick up the blanket. "I'm gonna put this back, and, uh… my clothes are in that box over there, if you wanna grab some stuff for the both of us."

Thrown by the suggestion, Goro hesitates for a second. It does make sense, though, doesn't it? To wear something of Ren's now, instead of his uniform — which very well could be the only set of his own clothing that he has left. Depending on whether his apartment has been ransacked by Shido's goons or discovered by the authorities.

So he makes his way over to the other set of shelves — the ones behind Ren's laughably old TV and close to the top of the stairs — and pulls at the large cardboard box that's wedged in there. The fact that this is where Ren has to store his clothes is slightly… grim, but he decides to keep that observation to himself, for now.

How Goro usually dresses is probably best described as 'business casual' (both out of personal preference and because it's always been an essential part of his 'brand'), but he can already tell, as he peers down into the box, that it's not a look that he's going to be able to achieve using Ren's clothes. For starters, the closest thing that Ren seems to have to dress pants or chinos are several pairs of slightly worn jeans.

But while they're not exactly ideal, he supposes that they're something he can live with.

For the short term, at least.

Certainly, they're still preferable to more sweatpants, or a tracksuit, or the hideous Shujin-plaid of Ren's uniform pants.

He pulls out two of the better looking (not that that's saying much) pairs of jeans, and sets them aside.

Continuing his search, he comes across a black turtleneck that he can remember Ren wearing in January (although this is, technically, the first time he's seeing it), and, after a moment's deliberation, adds it to the pile intended for Ren. It looks good on him, yes, but it will also serve another important purpose: covering up the string of purple bruises that Goro left on his neck and shoulder last night.

Particularly when he's realising just how many of Ren's shirts are cut very low around the neck.

It's something that he's always appreciated about Ren's wardrobe, when said shirts were actually on Ren. However, now that he's trying to find something to wear for himself, Goro's having to admit that what's apparently Ren's preferred choice of neckline is also definitely outside his own comfort zone. So, bypassing the sweatshirts and the t-shirts entirely, he settles on one of the white button-ups that he's seen Ren wear (open, and over a t-shirt), for himself. Not that he'll be wearing it unbuttoned, of course — mostly because he's not the male lead in a trashy romance novel.

Giving it a quick once-over, it becomes clear why he only ever remembers seeing Ren wear it with the sleeves rolled up. One of the cuffs is missing its button entirely.

Also, genuinely, it looks as if it's never seen an iron in its life.

Regardless, it will have to do, he supposes.

The button-up joins the turtleneck and the jeans, along with two sets of (hopefully) plain socks.

The next thing that he goes looking for, unsurprisingly, is underwear. Goro typically wears boxer briefs and Ren apparently prefers something looser and less form-fitting — that's not much of an issue, in and of itself, it's more the fact that every single pair seems to be completely covered with inane cartoons and slogans. Several pairs of gaudy boxer shorts later, he finds a blue pair that, at first glance, appear to only have a small Jack Frost on the front (just under the waistband and to the left), and he's just thinking about how they're acceptable enough when then he turns them over in his hands and discovers the phrase 'HEE-HO' printed in large characters across the backside.

What the fuck.

Feeling his eye twitch, he has to put considerable effort into unclenching his hands, where they've balled into fists in the material, so he can set them aside (for Ren to wear, of course), before he can resume his search. Finally (and at the very bottom of the box), he finds a plain black pair that, thankfully, do not appear to have any crass messages or imagery hidden on the rear.

Pile of clothes in hand, he heads back over to the other side of the room, where Ren is standing, seemingly unconcerned about his nudity, as he busies himself with something on the shelf.

Goro may take a few seconds to let his eyes roam (who knows how many more times he'll have the opportunity to see Ren like this, after all), before his curiosity gets the better of him.

"What are you doing?"

Actually jumping a little on the spot, Ren steps to the side with a slightly sheepish smile on his face. "I was just trying to find a good place for this…"

Goro looks past him, to the swan boat replica on the shelf, and the striped uniform tie that Ren has twisted into a chaotic knot around its neck.

"You don't know how to tie a tie?" Goro laughs, equal parts fond and derisive, as he pushes the bundle of clothes into Ren's hands. "Let me do it. Before you hurt yourself."

It takes a couple of tries for him to be able to undo the absolute mess that Ren has managed to tangle the tie into, but once it's free, he loops it around the curved 's' of plastic a few times (so it won't be too loose) and finishes it with a simple half-Windsor knot.

"That does look a million times better," Ren admits, beaming at him, and then plants a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth. "Thanks, Goro."

Hopefully, Ren doesn't notice how embarrassingly flustered he gets over being thanked for doing something as simple as tying his own fucking tie.

They get dressed after that, with Ren pausing, of course, to show off how, yes, he can actually pull off the ridiculous 'HEE-HO' underwear. When it comes to clothes, Ren prefers a looser fit than Goro does, obviously, but they do wear, essentially, the same size and everything he picked out fits well enough.

It's hard not to be reminded of that phonecall, last year, when he'd suggested (half-joking, half-flirting, all-manipulation) that Ren could probably get away with wearing his clothes.

Truly, it feels like a lifetime ago…

Then Ren presses a still-in-the-packet toothbrush into his hand, and Goro is brought back to reality.

"I always keep a few spares," Ren explains, unprompted, as he picks up the little cup that holds his own toothbrush and toothpaste, "just in case someone sleeps over."

"Oh?" Goro asks, and he can hear the poison seeping into his tone already, even though he knows he's being petty and ridiculous. "Do you have these kinds of sleepovers with all of your friends?"

And how does Ren react? He just laughs at him. Which is understandable, really, and then catches Goro's chin in his hand to pull him close for a kiss — which is decidedly less so.

"No, I've never done anything like this with my other friends," Ren says, bumping their foreheads together lightly. He still sounds amused but also painfully sincere. "Goro, you're the first person I've, uh, slept with — and the only one I've done, like, ninety percent of the other stuff with as well. You know, if that's what you're asking."

And it wasn't, not seriously, but it's still nice to know.

It's also a conversation that they probably should have had before crossing the line in the first place, but, well, it wouldn't be the first time that Ren has clouded his judgement, would it?

"It's the same for me," Goro half-lies, deciding to leave it unsaid that Ren is the first person who he's ever done anything with.

Because, while drawing with Ren in something is bearable, losing is not.

Smiling, Ren kisses him once more, on the nose this time, before stepping back. "Okay," he starts, pausing to slip his stupid, fake glasses onto his face, and then rolls his neck like he's just about to start an infiltration, "I'm going to go down first and give Sojiro the heads-up. I'll call you when you're good to follow."

"And what happens if Sakura-san is not 'good' with my being here?"

Ren actually looks shocked by the idea.

"Sojiro isn't like that," he says, waving one hand dismissively. "He can be kind of a grouch sometimes, sure, but he practically collects kids at this point."

Goro debates with himself about whether he should remind Ren of the fact that he caused Wakaba Isshiki's death, and how he also remembers her file well enough to know that she and Sojiro Sakura were… he's not sure if they were romantically involved, but he knows that they had been extremely close. The simple fact that Sakura adopted Isshiki's daughter (and treats her with all the care he would if she were his own) is testament enough to how important that relationship had been.

And Goro is the one who took that away from him.

"If you say so…" is the absolute nonsense response that comes out of his mouth instead.

He could almost slap himself.

"I do," Ren says, flashing one of his 'leader' smiles as he reaches out to squeeze Goro's shoulder, before making for the stairs.

Goro tries to smother the uneasy feeling in his gut as Ren disappears out of sight. Lurking near the top of the stairs, he gnaws compulsively on his thumbnail (they would have looked really fucking stupid with this outfit, but he wishes that he'd still put his gloves on. They're the only thing that prevents him from biting his nails to the quick when he's stressed), as he strains his ears in an attempt to catch any snippets of conversation from down in the café.

It would seem that Ren was right; sound really does not seem to travel well between the two floors. Even though Goro is actively trying to eavesdrop, all he can hear is very faint mumbling — he can't even be sure if it's Ren's voice or Sakura's that he's hearing.

Or if perhaps it's actually just the TV.

It's reassuring, at least, to know that Sakura, in all likelihood, hadn't overheard any of their activities this morning. Knowing that his daughter heard more than she ever should have the night before is bad enough.

The seconds tick by, unbearably slow, but eventually, Ren calls for him from the bottom of the stairs.

"You can come down now, Goro!"

And it certainly doesn't sound like anything is amiss, so Goro shrugs, catches himself going to fix a tie that he isn't wearing, takes a deep breath, and goes.

It's a strange echo of last night, in a way — descending into the café and being completely unsure about what is going to happen once he gets down there.

The anticipation isn't quite as dreadful as it had been then, but it's close.

At least Ren is waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs. And he's smiling, which is (presumably) a good sign.

The first thing that Goro notices, as he walks with Ren, past the bathroom door and into the café proper, is that Futaba Sakura and Morgana are both fast asleep in the middle booth — apparently undisturbed by the noise of Ren's ass hitting the floor (or the ceiling, from their perspective, Goro supposes) earlier. The cat is sprawled lazily across the back of the booth seat, and the girl is slumped over the table, using a folded up jacket as a makeshift pillow. There are two laptops on the table in front of her, and the rest of the surface is absolutely covered with a truly staggering amount of technological paraphernalia. Goro can't even begin to put names to half of it.

A low whistle cuts through the quiet to his left, and he nearly jumps out of his skin.

"Hoo-boy... it really is you," Sojiro Sakura says, emerging from the little kitchen nook behind the counter, and wiping his hands with a dishrag that he then slings over his shoulder. He looks resigned, but doesn't appear to be angry or upset. Goro is immediately wary. "And here I thought you kids had run out of ways to surprise me."

Chapter Text

Standing in the entryway of his home, Sojiro Sakura steps out of his slippers and into his loafers as he grabs his keys out of the dish on top of the little cabinet beside him. Trying, as usual, to do it all as quietly as possible. Futaba may keep odd hours, but she is usually asleep when he leaves each morning to go open Leblanc.

But then, just as he places his hat on his head and is about to reach for the door, he hears a series of thumps from the floor above him, quickly followed by the sound of a door opening, and a stampede of many small feet rushing for the stairs.

Clearly, he was sneaking around for no reason.

Morgana appears first, jumping gracefully out of the stairwell and into the hallway. Bright blue eyes meet his, and the cat meows loudly — several times in quick succession — obviously trying to tell him something. It's very cute, so much so that Sojiro doesn't quite have the heart to point out, for the hundredth time since he learned that Morgana can talk, that he has no idea what he's saying.

It occurs to him, as Morgana scampers up the hallway towards him, that he could have sworn that the cat had still been in Leblanc last night when he was closing up.

Strange.

"Sooooojiiiiroooo!" Futaba isn't far behind Morgana, and she comes down the stairs so fast that she skids on the wooden floor and almost into the far wall. "Wait! We're coming with you!"

Recovering from her near fall, she jogs up to the edge of the entryway, stepping over Morgana on the way, and struggling to adjust the heavy-looking bag that she has slung over her shoulder.

"Here," Sojiro sighs, reaching out to take it from her. "Give me that."

"Thanks, Sojiro!" she grins, pitching him a little salute as she hands the bag over. It weighs a damn tonne, and he comes very close to stumbling and dropping it.

"Yeesh, Futaba," he huffs, as he hoists the bag up and over his own shoulder, and tries to ignore the way his lower back creaks in protest, "what have you got in here? Bricks?"

"One of the laptops in there is kinda old and crappy, but I wouldn't say that it's bricked," she says, laughing at her own joke as she hops down into the entryway. Sojiro knows better than to ask what she means. "Not yet, anyway."

He watches her open the shoe cabinet and pull out a pair of tall black boots — the ones with thick, chunky soles, and a hell of a lot more buckles on them than can possibly be necessary.

They're also nearly as big as she is.

Just looking at them makes Sojiro's feet hurt.

She blows at the hair hanging in her face as she sits down to pull the boots on, and Sojiro can't help but frown when he notices the dark circles under her eyes. He can only hope that going back to school will be the thing that finally gets her back on a semi-normal sleep schedule. Wakaba had always been the same, though, even when she had to be up early for work. He can still remember her joking about needing to be hooked up to an IV of his coffee just to get through the day... so maybe expecting Futaba to be any better is unrealistic.

He understands why she's up so early, of course; he just wishes that she'd actually gone to sleep at a reasonable hour last night to make up for it.

"That desperate to go see Ren, huh?" he chuckles. "You know he won't be out of bed for hours, right?"

"Yeah, probably..." she admits, fingers fastening the buckles on her boots at breakneck speed. "But that's not important right now! I have some critical intel that you need."

With Futaba, that might just mean that she wants him to buy her some new gadget, or it could be something about the literal end of the world.

Or anything in between.

"Oh?" Sojiro checks his watch. Sunday is generally a quiet day for the café, but he does still usually have some customers first thing in the morning, and he doesn't want to keep them waiting. "Do you think we can fit the debrief into our walk to Leblanc?"

"Quest marker added!" Futaba cries, jumping up and pushing past him to open the door. She marches outside without looking back.

"I'll take that as a yes?" he says to the empty entryway.

Or not so empty, after all, he thinks, as Morgana mews up at him — before he slips out through the door too. Sojiro wonders if he's imagining the sympathy in that little voice, and then thinks about how strange it is that their cat commiserating with him is even a possibility in the first place.

Shaking his head, he double-checks that he has his wallet, cigarettes, phone, and keys before he follows them — then double and triple-checks that he locked the door, because he's still paranoid about that time he came home to find nearly the entire gang of kids in his house.

"Right," he says, pulling his lighter and the battered pack of cigarettes out of his pocket as he walks away from the house, "what's going on?"

Futaba falls into step beside him, clomping through the shallow puddles left over from last night's rain. Morgana hangs loosely from her arms, like a furry rag doll that bounces lightly with each step.

She doesn't seem to be in any real hurry to answer, which isn't unusual for her — Sojiro is more than used to Futaba taking a few minutes to get her thoughts in order before she speaks — so they just walk together in comfortable silence while he waits for her to be ready.

Focusing instead on getting his morning nicotine hit, he flips the little cardboard lid on the pack of cigarettes open and peers inside.

Damn.

There's only one (sad and slightly bent) smoke left in the box.

He wonders if he can convince Ren to watch the café for him for half an hour later (whenever he finally drags his ass out of bed), so he can go buy some more. Although he doesn't really want to make the kid work on his last proper day in Tokyo, so he might just have to make do…

He's gotten too used to having Ren around to help out, and just around in general.

Sojiro's really going to miss him once he's gone.

It would be overstepping, and definitely sticking his nose in where it doesn't belong, so it's not something that he would ever actually do… but he thinks again, about how much he wants to contact Ren's parents and pitch the idea of continuing on in his role as the kid's guardian, so he can finish out his last year of high school at Shujin.

There's no way in hell that sending Ren back to that rumour mill is the right choice for his education, or his well-being, when he's settled in so well here.

It's pointless, though; Sojiro knows that just caring about Ren isn't enough to make him his father — the same way that being Ren's actual parents isn't enough to make the Amamiyas give a rat's ass about what's best for their son.

Pushing those thoughts far away and into the back of his mind, he pinches his last smoke between his fingers and tries to straighten it out — carefully, so that it doesn't break — before catching it in the corner of his mouth. After a couple of failed attempts to get it lit, he brings the hand not holding his lighter up to shield the flame from the brisk March breeze, just as Futaba takes a big, deep breath.

"Okay!" she starts. "So... uh, do you remember Akechi?"

Sojiro falters, completely blindsided, and fumbles with his lighter, making it spark uselessly in his hand again instead of actually lighting the end of his smoke.

"Yeah, of course I remember him," Sojiro replies. It would be hard to forget that kid, even if things hadn't gone down the way they had. "What's this all about?"

It's a sore topic for obvious reasons, but maybe the kids are going to do something to acknowledge the fact that Ren has been in mourning for months? Even if he hides it well, Sojiro would have to be blind to miss how heartbroken he's been.

He wouldn't mind helping them organise a little memorial, even if it is a bit last minute.

"He, um, kinda, s-sorta—" Futaba stutters and takes another big breath. Sojiro watches her with growing concern. "Came back."

Stopping dead in his tracks, Sojiro finds himself thrown for a loop (for the second time in as many minutes), as what Futaba just said properly sinks in. His last cigarette falls, forgotten, from his lips.

It lands in a puddle with a sad little splash.

Futaba takes a few more steps before she realises that he's not walking with her.

"Hang on a second," he says, as she turns, "didn't this already happen?"

Because he's heard the story — heard all about the weird brainwashing thing that half the country had been caught up in at the start of the year. The kids had to explain it to him when they all showed up at Leblanc in February, back when not one of them had any idea where Ren was, even though he'd already been in juvie for two months at that point.

Sojiro doesn't recall any of that alternate reality himself, not clearly anyway. Only hazy little snippets, like a half-remembered dream.

He thinks that might be for the best.

Ultimately, what it all boiled down to was that it had, once again, fallen to a bunch of teenagers to make all the hard decisions and to save the world.

And he knows that Akechi kid was right there with them, fighting alongside them, despite their history, and even though he was supposed to be dead — just like Sojiro also knows that he's supposed to have gone back to being dead once everything else returned to normal.

"Yeah, uh, it's kind of complicated..." Futaba mumbles. And Sojiro believes her, because when is it ever simple with these kids? "But he is back, and I'm pretty sure it's for real this time—"

Despite how obviously lost he is, she launches into the explanation anyway. No surprise there. A little thing like him not having the faintest clue about what she's saying has never stopped her before. She really gets into the nitty-gritty of it, as well, talking about dreams and actualisation, and he swears that he might actually be able to smell his brain cooking.

Sojiro would consider himself to be a pretty intelligent man, in his own way, but everyone has their strengths, and this is all a little outside his wheelhouse.

He always misses Wakaba. It's a dull ache that he'll probably never be rid of, like the phantom pain of a missing limb, but there are times when it's keener. When he feels like he's completely lost without her.

Like back when Futaba had first come to live with him, and he'd spent hours in the local pharmacy (after grabbing a new first aid kit and anything else he felt was missing from his medicine cabinet), hemming and hawing over all the different 'feminine hygiene' products (because Futaba was at that age, right? And he shouldn't wait for her to come and ask, should he? What if she was too embarrassed?), until he'd just bought one of everything and left them in a bag outside her bedroom door. Of course, he'd quickly found out that he had been all het up over nothing when she sent him an awkward little 'thank you' text to tell him she could buy everything she needed online.

And he'd needed Wakaba, desperately, when Futaba's depression got so bad that it reached the point where she wouldn't come out of her room anymore, when she would barely say more than two words to him through the door when he brought her clean laundry or food. When the doctors that he spoke to were completely useless, and just left him terrified that he was going to get a call from a social worker saying that they were going to have to remove her from his care.

But this — this Phantom Thief/cognitive psience stuff? It's all so far above his pay grade that he doesn't even know where to begin.

Wakaba would have, though. She'd have known exactly how to handle all of this.

Futaba stops talking then, trailing off, and Sojiro wonders if he's going to have to prompt her for the layman's version of everything she just said, when Morgana suddenly becomes very talkative, and she almost jumps to attention.

"Right! Yeah, the important thing," she says, "is that he's in Leblanc!"

Well, that's…

That's something.

It's a problem that he knows how to approach, at least.

"Are you going to be alright?" he asks carefully. "Coming with me to the café, I mean. If he's there?"

She spends a couple of seconds watching her feet while she walks, like she's searching for the right words in the puddles she's trudging through.

"In January, when he came back the first time, we had to let him rejoin as a temporary party member, y'know? We needed the extra firepower to fight Maruki — he doesn't look it, but Akechi's DPS is no joke," she says conspiratorially, as if Sojiro has the foggiest notion of what that means. "I guess that this all just makes me feel a bit like I'm reloading a save? Like, I've done this already, and I know that I can take it, even if it is probably gonna suck.

"I mean, I don't think I'll ever be able to forgive him, for what he did… to Mom, and to all those other people… But I-I've been thinking it over, and I, uh, can't really blame him either, not really, not after all the Shido stuff… And he did kind of sacrifice himself for us, twice..." She stops then, and there's a flash of uncertainty in her expression for a second before it hardens into something more determined. Shifting Morgana to the side and into the crook of her elbow, she does a little fist-pump with her now free hand. "It won't be easy, I know that — but I want to give him a chance. For me, and for Mom."

There's suddenly a lump in Sojiro's throat, and his eyes are damp in a way that he can't quite blame on the breeze. "I'm so proud of you, Futaba," he says, reaching out to ruffle her hair, "and Wakaba would be too."

"Heh, thanks, Sojiro," she sniffles, grinning and rubbing at her nose with her free hand. Then she gets this serious look on her face and peers up at him over the rims of her glasses. "But what about you? How do you feel about it?"

It's a valid question, but he's still surprised by it, and he has to take a second to think it over.

Truthfully, he wouldn't say that he thinks that Akechi is blameless, no, but Sojiro knows (both from being told directly, and by virtue of just being in the same room when the kids were talking about it) that he also had the deck completely stacked against him. Because he must have been... what? Fifteen? Maybe sixteen years old? When Shido got his claws into him. And all kids that age are screw-ups; they're supposed to be, it's part of growing up — but they're also supposed to be able to do it safely, under the watchful eye of a parent or guardian.

Taking his age into account, along with the isolation, cognitive psience superpowers, and an asshole of a father who was all too happy to take advantage of all of those things... Well, it was just a recipe for disaster.

The thing is, though, if he's honest... his only real priority is how it affects the kids in his care.

He reaches up to adjust his hat and shrugs. "Look, as long as you're okay, and Ren's okay, then I'm okay."

"Pffft, don't worry about Ren," she laughs and rolls her eyes, and Sojiro isn't quite sure what to make of that, but he decides not to press — they're already running late as it is. "And I'm all good to go."

So that's what they do — resuming their short journey to the café. Futaba and Morgana chatter to each other as they go, and Sojiro waves to the handful of neighbours and shopkeepers that they see on their way.

There are already a couple of old-timers huddled under the awning when they get to Leblanc, and they make a fuss over Futaba and Morgana while he unlocks the door. Smiling, he's hit with another wave of pride when she quietly replies to their attempts at small talk — it feels like only yesterday that she needed to hide under that big novelty mask just to have a conversation with other people.

Opening the door, Sojiro ushers everyone in ahead of him before following them inside. Skimming the interior of the café as he heads behind the counter, he finds nothing out of the ordinary. Everything still seems to be in its proper place, as far as he can tell…

There certainly isn't anything that screams 'a dead kid magically re-materialised here last night' anyway.

In the end, the morning passes like any other. More or less. He turns on the TV, starts the water boiling for the coffee siphons and checks on the curry pot that's been simmering away on a low heat overnight. The only real difference is having Futaba sitting in the centre booth, chatting with Morgana as she works away on something complicated that apparently requires two laptops, a whole pile of tech junk, and one extremely small screwdriver.

The hours tick by, a handful of customers come and go, and unsurprisingly, there's no sign of Ren (or Akechi, for that matter), because he can't remember the last time the kid got up before eleven on a Sunday. He's washing a couple of cups at the sink at around half nine, when he looks up to see Futaba making a pillow for herself out of her coat.

"Tired of waiting?"

"Nah, I'm just gonna rest my eyes for a minute," she says, unconvincingly, and through a yawn, "my MP is dangerously low… need to let it regen..."

Morgana bats at her shoulder and meows something that sounds, funnily enough, like he's scolding her.

"Yeah, yeah, Mona," she huffs, waving her hand at the cat until he leaves her alone and jumps up onto the back of the seat behind her, "maybe I'd have been able to get some sleep last night if you hadn't woken me up — didja' ever think about that, huh?"

Chuckling to himself, Sojiro gets back to work, and things are quiet again after that, mostly. Although he is almost positive that he hears movement (and maybe even voices) coming from upstairs once or twice, but it's nothing definite — nothing that couldn't potentially just be his nerves playing tricks on him.

Not until just after eleven, when something hits the floor above him with a heavy thud that actually shakes the lighting fixtures above the bar. Sojiro is leaning over his crossword, still trying to figure out ten across, when it happens, making him jerk in surprise, and sending his pen skittering across the page, leaving a jagged blue line in its wake.

Futaba, for her part, doesn't stir, but Morgana sits up, suddenly alert, eyes wide, and ears swivelled towards the stairs.

"What the hell is going on up there?" he grumbles in Morgana's general direction as he rounds the bar and heads for the bottom of the stairs.

The cat, of course, only meows at him, then stands, stretches, yawns, turns in a circle, and curls right back up into a sleepy ball. Apparently unconcerned.

That's reassuring, at least. He's sure that Morgana would be able to hear if they were killing each other up there. Maybe they're just roughhousing…? Although, that Akechi kid never did really seem like the type — what with his fussy little sweater vests and all…

Then another possibility occurs to him, as he thinks back on how quick Futaba was to say he didn't need to worry about Ren earlier. The implication is suddenly obvious, and it would line up with some of his own past suspicions about the relationship between those boys.

He hadn't suggested that the two of them go to the bathhouse together that time because he actually thought they needed a good soak, after all.

No, he'd just been fed up watching the two of them making moon eyes at each other across the bar, and thought that they needed a little nudge in the right direction.

But then everything in November happened, and he'd assumed that he'd read them wrong — or that he'd at least read Akechi wrong.

There's that small twinge of worry in Sojiro's chest again.

"Kid?" he calls, keeping one eye on Futaba as he does. She doesn't even twitch. "You okay up there?"

A few tense seconds pass, but then Ren's head pops into view above him, leaning over the bannister. The kid is obviously still in one piece, anyway, but he's not wearing a shirt… and, Sojiro might not have the best viewing angle from down here, but he's pretty sure that there's an angry-looking purple mark on the side of his neck.

"I'm fine, Boss!" Ren beams down at him, flushed and out of breath. "Be down in a few minutes!"

And then he disappears again.

Blinking up a couple of times at the empty space, Sojiro groans, removing his glasses with one hand so that he can drag the other down his face.

Teenagers.

He can see that Futaba was right on the money.

Sojiro's not going to think too closely about how she knew, though. Some things are just better left a mystery.

If something like this had happened last year, he'd have had to sit Ren down and have the uncomfortable conversation about setting some ground rules when it came to having these kinds of 'sleepovers' in his place of business, but he supposes that he can let it slide, since the kid is only here for one more night…

And at least he won't have to talk to him about birth control.

Ren's 'few minutes' turns out to be closer to fifteen, and Sojiro is starting to get a little antsy, when he finally hears the familiar sound of the kid's boots on the stairs. The first thing that stands out to Sojiro, as being unusual, when Ren comes into sight, is that he's wearing a turtleneck, which — yeah, that pretty much confirms that the bruise on his neck that he glimpsed earlier was a bite mark.

The less he thinks about that, the better.

The second thing is that the kid looks more sheepish than Sojiro has ever seen him, even more so than when he first came to stay here a year ago.

"Mornin'..." Ren says, voice small, as he hangs back awkwardly on the opposite side of the room, instead of coming to sit at the bar like he would on any other morning.

Sojiro decides to put him out of his misery.

"Look, Kid. I know, alright?" he says with a sigh. "Futaba already told me… so you can just, ah, bring him down for some breakfast."

Some of the tension goes out of Ren's shoulders, and at least he loses that 'deer caught in the headlights' look, even if he does still sound nervous when he asks, "You're sure it's okay?"

"I wouldn't have suggested it if it wasn't." It comes out a little harsher than he intended, but if anything, that just seems to reassure Ren. The kid knows him too well. "Curry's in the pot, and there are a couple of eggs there too — if he'd prefer something like that. It's on the house, but you're the one who's taking care of everything, you hear me?"

"I do. Thanks, Sojiro." Ren sounds deeply and incredibly relieved. "Really, it means a lot to me."

"It's nothing; don't worry about it." Sojiro coughs and looks away, wiping the bar down with a dishrag. It's spotless, but Ren probably can't see that from all the way over there.

Thankfully, Morgana chooses that moment to try and get Ren's attention, and Sojiro takes the opportunity to duck back into the kitchen area. Busying himself with checking on the curry, while he keeps one ear trained on their little conversation — he hears Ren apologise to Morgana for last night, and promise to make it up to him.

So he'd been right; Morgana had been in the café when he was closing up yesterday evening, after all.

It's good to know that he's not going senile.

"Oh, uh, Sojiro?"

"What is it now, Kid?"

"Morgana says that Futaba didn't tell you," Ren mumbles, glancing over at where she's still slumped over the table, "so, uh, sorry for the short notice, but everyone is on their way over…"

Well, it wouldn't be the first time that they'd all dropped in unannounced. He's just glad that he had the forethought to stock back up on soda. Futaba might drink coffee if there's nothing else there, but he knows that Ryuji kid won't touch it.

"It's fine," he says, waving a dismissive hand at Ren — who grins at him before turning and disappearing back into the space that leads to the bathroom, and the stairwell, to call up to the other kid.

"You can come down now, Goro!"

There's the sound of shoes on the stairs again, slower and quieter than when Ren came down at a half jog earlier. Sojiro watches Morgana jump from the back of the seat behind Futaba (who is still unconscious) to the opposite side of the booth, and how he lies down, closes his eyes, and seemingly goes back to sleep — all while putting himself directly between her and the point where Akechi is going to be entering the room. Touched by the protective gesture, Sojiro makes a mental note to pick up some of the nicer sushi from the grocery store around the corner for Morgana later.

Ren and Akechi walk into the café together, and Sojiro is caught off guard by just how thrown he is... seeing this dead kid standing there, very much alive and looking a whole lot less put-together than Sojiro is used to. Maybe he was being foolish, thinking that it had properly sunk in just by talking about it with Futaba, because he's rapidly realising that he hadn't honestly believed it until now — now that he's actually seeing Akechi with his own two eyes.

He whistles, low and through his teeth, and Akechi starts at the sound, whirling to look at him with wide, distrustful eyes. Reminding Sojiro of the way Futaba used to flinch, tellingly, at every loud noise, for weeks after he'd gotten her away from her asshole uncle.

Akechi, though — he collects himself quickly, hiding his panicked wariness behind an expression that's deceptively neutral. Sojiro would be impressed if it wasn't so damn sad.

"Hoo-boy... it really is you," he says, walking back to his usual spot behind the bar, "and here I thought you kids had run out of ways to surprise me."

"Good morning, Sakura-san." Akechi drops into a deep bow. "I apologise for intruding like this."

"The way Futaba tells it, it doesn't sound like you had much of a choice." Sojiro clears his throat awkwardly, and waits for Akechi to straighten back up before he gestures towards the stools at the bar. "Now, sit down, and I'll get you a cup of coffee. You're probably going to need it; the other kids are all going to be here any minute now."

Akechi just stares at him for a long second, as if an invitation to take a seat was the literal last thing that he expected Sojiro to say to him — and it looks like he might actually question it, mouth parted slightly and eyebrows drawn together in confusion. But then, he seems to think better of looking a gift horse in the mouth and mumbles a quiet 'thank you' as he moves to sit on a stool, the one that he always used to favour, back when he was still a regular here.

Catching Ren's eye, Sojiro jerks his thumb behind him towards the kitchen. "Don't forget that we already agreed that you're on breakfast duty this morning, Kid."

"Oh, right!" Ren jumps a little, like he'd been off somewhere in his own head, and casts one last lovesick look at the other boy's back before he rounds the counter, grabbing his apron off the hook on the way.

Making coffee comes as easily as breathing to Sojiro, and he has a steaming cup on the bar in front of Akechi in no time at all. Which means that the kid does, at the very least, have the time to get through half a cup in relative peace, before the little bell at the entrance jingles ominously.

Ann comes through the door first, followed by Yusuke, and then Ryuji and Makoto, who have Haru sandwiched protectively between them. Sojiro can tell that she's been crying — though probably not recently. Her eyes might be puffy, but her make-up is still perfect.

It's kind of funny, watching five teenagers nearly falling over each other so they can stay huddled together just inside the door. Each one of them clearly anxious about the kid sitting at the bar — the one who looks just as wary of them as they do of him.

Ren chooses that exact moment to swan out of the kitchen nook with a bowl in one hand and a plate in the other, smiling brightly. Sojiro would bet money on it all being bravado, though — there's no way that he's not nervous as hell.

But, he supposes, there's a reason that they all follow Ren, and sometimes, being a leader means lying out your ass.

"Hi, guys," he says, walking casually up along the inside of the bar. Stopping just beside Sojiro and in front of Akechi, he places the bowl down beside the other boy's coffee cup. Sojiro can see that it's egg on rice, rather than the curry that Ren has on his own plate. Akechi doesn't even glance at it, too busy trying to stare the others down like a cornered animal. "Are you going to come in or just keep standing there?"

"Yeah, s-stop making it weird," Futaba pipes up, pushing her glasses up her nose, and cringing only slightly in her seat when everyone turns to look at her. Sojiro hadn't even noticed that she'd woken up.

And maybe there's something to just pretending that everything is normal, because that seems to do the trick. They all start filing in, each making their own little awkward effort to greet Akechi as they wedge themselves into the booth with Futaba — who ropes Yusuke into helping her move most of her equipment off the table and onto the ledge at the side of the booth, beside the old magazines.

Sojiro takes their drink orders: coffee for everyone, except for Futaba and Ryuji, who want soda, and Morgana, who (according to the kids) would like some milk. Ren removes his apron and takes his curry to go sit on the barstool beside Akechi, and Sojiro doesn't miss the way he reaches out to squeeze Akechi's wrist as he does it.

Ann at least definitely catches it too, and she doesn't look particularly surprised. He wonders how many of them actually know that Ren and Akechi are... what? Going out?

Sojiro sighs to himself. He's too old for all this teenage drama.

The café is deathly quiet as he pours the drinks; the only sounds are Futaba tapping away on her keyboard, the coffee siphons, and the soft scrape of utensils as Ren and Akechi eat their breakfasts.

Most of the kids have their noses buried in their phones when he brings them their orders, and he's just glad to have something to do with his hands, if only to take the edge off the awkward silence hanging over them.

He's surprised when Akechi is the one to break it.

Although it does make a kind of sense, Sojiro supposes. Out of all the kids, he is probably the one who has the most experience with having to speak in front of a tough crowd. Sojiro can still remember how the people on TV ripped into him after the whole Medjed fiasco, and how Akechi had smiled politely through all of it.

"Are we waiting for Yoshizawa-san?" Akechi asks, and it comes out smoothly enough, even though Sojiro can see how tightly he's holding onto the handle of his coffee cup, knuckles nearly as white as the ceramic.

Futaba answers him, and her voice only shakes a little when she does. "Sumire has some gymnastics thing, she's not back until tomorrow."

"I see..." Akechi sets his cup down gently, pushes his still-half-full bowl away from himself, and turns slightly on his stool to face the other kids. "Well, as enjoyable as all this peace and quiet has been, I'm sure that you have questions, and for once, I don't have any reason not to answer them, so — ask away."

That sends a rumble of murmurs through the group in the booth. Sojiro isn't surprised that they all seem to be looking to Makoto for guidance. There's already a line in the sand, and Ren is sitting on the other side of it. With Akechi.

"I'll start with the obvious question, then, Akechi-kun," she says, tone firm and all business. "How exactly is this possible? How are you able to be here?"

Akechi chuckles into a loose fist. "This reminds me a little of when I spoke at Shujin's culture festival." He's holding himself and speaking almost exactly the same way he used to when he was giving interviews on TV, and even though it is a little eerie, Sojiro doesn't really understand why the rest of them all seem either confused or annoyed by it.

Not until Ann speaks up.

"This is weird," she says, scrunching her nose. "Why are you acting all nice again?"

The smile falls off Akechi's face at an alarming speed, and without it, he just looks resigned and incredibly tired. "Would you prefer that I didn't?"

"Kinda?" Ryuji says, rubbing at the back of his neck with one hand. "Even if the real you is kind of an asshole, that's still better than being fake, ya know?"

Sojiro is definitely missing something here.

"I was just trying to… never mind," Akechi sighs, and then drags a hand over his face. "I saw all of you talking about it in the chat this morning, so you already know that the Velvet Room was involved. That's where I've been all this time, in some kind of suspended animation — and no, before you ask, I don't remember it — they were keeping me there until my soul could recover enough for me to come back."

"I felt your signal disappear in Shido's Palace, though," Futaba says, without looking up from her laptop, "how does that work? Did you just clip through the floor?"

"Clip…? What does that even…? No, actually, don't answer that. Look, I was just as confused as you are." Akechi holds his hands up as he says it, and Sojiro doubts that any of them are as confused as he is. "I remember being shot, I remember losing more blood than is even remotely survivable, and I still woke up in the Velvet Room last night, regardless."

"It's because he's a Wild Card, like me," Ren says conversationally, spinning his spoon on the knuckle of his thumb. "Turns out, we can't really die in the Metaverse."

There's a ruckus as the kids and Morgana all react to that.

Sojiro shifts from one foot to the other, uncomfortable. He doesn't enjoy being reminded of just how dangerous the double lives that these kids had been living could get. He wonders sometimes if there's more that he could have done to help, to keep them safe — but he still has nightmares about Christmas Eve, the rain of blood, and the towers of bone…

What was one washed up government official supposed to do in the face of actual gods?

He's just grateful that it's done now, and they can all get back to being normal teenagers again.

"And what of the January you spent with us?" Yusuke asks. "Morgana told us that Maruki plucked you from the icy clutches of Death itself."

"If I'm being charitable," Akechi sneers, "I'd say that Maruki just made an assumption — one based on your memories and the fact that I wasn't technically in the land of the living when he started bending reality."

"And if you're being uncharitable?" Makoto prompts.

"I'd say that he knew, and actively lied about it to manipulate Ren."

"Maruki-sensei wouldn't—" Ren starts, but Akechi cuts him off.

"Wouldn't what? Use me as a fucking bargaining chip to force your hand?! Because that's exactly what he did, Ren, and you know it!"

Ren opens his mouth to protest, but he closes it again when Morgana starts meowing. Sojiro can tell from the tight line of Ren's jaw that the cat is probably agreeing (at least in part) with Akechi.

And after Sojiro recovers from the initial shock of hearing the Akechi kid swearing like a damn sailor, the rest of what he said starts to sink in — the fact that Ren had been essentially blackmailed by that man is news to him. There's a flash of dull anger in his chest when he thinks back to the time that mild-mannered school counsellor was sitting right here, at the bar, speaking with Futaba about her mother's research. He should have trusted his instincts and kicked him out the second he mentioned Wakaba's name.

Not that it would have made any difference to what happened, but at least he would have felt good about it.

Morgana stops talking, Ren doesn't seem inclined to try to argue the point again, and Akechi is just staring at his hands, where they're folded in his lap.

A handful of tense seconds tick by before Makoto speaks up. "Akechi-kun," she says, "I do have another question for you — and obviously, you don't have to answer it if you don't want to, but... the revenge plan that you outlined to us in the engine room… I've always wondered about what it actually entailed? Or how you came to be involved with Shido in the first place? I can't make sense of it in my head..."

"Ah, I was wondering if Shido would come up," Akechi laughs, but it comes out mechanical and slightly flat. "If you'll indulge me, I would like to get something out of the way before I try to answer your question. I know that I said it already, in Mementos before, but I need to make sure that you understand that I am truly grateful to you for defeating Shido in my stead… Even if a change of heart isn't exactly how I would have done it, I appreciate it all the same."

"Yeah, dude, about that time in Mementos..." Ryuji starts, and his leg is bouncing so violently that he's practically vibrating in his seat, "I was a real dick to you when you tried to thank us, and I, uh, just wanna say sorry?"

"Please don't apologise to me, Sakamoto." Akechi sounds genuinely pained, and he sighs deeply, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. "Now, I'll do my best to answer the question, Niijima… I don't know how well I'll be able to explain… but the gist of it is: not long after I awakened to my powers, I learned that my father had a Palace—"

"How?" Yusuke cuts in, and the corner of Akechi's mouth spasms as he makes an obvious effort not to react poorly to being interrupted.

"It came to me in a dream, which I have recently come to learn, means that it was most likely Yaldabaoth's meddling — regardless, after some trial and error, I guessed Shido's keywords and entered his Palace. I realised very quickly, however, that I couldn't get anywhere near his shadow without those letters of introduction—"

The kids all nod in understanding.

"—and, of course, I wasn't strong enough at that point to acquire them by force… But I had an idea: if I approached him in reality and offered to help him get a leg up on his opponents — if I infiltrated his real-life inner circle — it might weaken his mental defences against me."

"Okay, that does kinda make sense," Futaba admits.

"Of course it does," Akechi tuts, "but, as I've already said, I was still pathetically weak then. All that I could really bring to the table was a way to spy on people's shadows for him and being able to cause minor scandals using Loki's fledgling abilities. But if there's one thing that my father is good at, it's bleeding every last drop of potential out of anything that he thinks might be of use to him. You see, Shido had already been interested in cognitive psience research for years when I approached him — he had his own little stable of pet researchers prepped and ready to figure out exactly just how useful I could be. So, as I'm sure you can imagine, it wasn't long before he became convinced that there were better applications for my powers... and that was when he started shutting down, and stealing, any and all work from competing academics in the field…"

"Mom…" Futaba whispers. Feeling helpless, Sojiro watches Ann reach across the table to squeeze her hand.

Interrupting and stopping the conversation is his first instinct, but he reminds himself of her conviction on the walk over this morning, and how she said that she wanted to do this.

"It was an accident..." Akechi says, voice tight, staring up at the ceiling. Nobody needs to ask for clarification about what he's referring to. "She just fought me so hard… and by the time I realised what had happened it was already too late… and I know that doesn't excuse it, but it is the truth…" he trails off and takes a breath, lowering his eyes to meet Futaba's. "Do you want me to stop?"

"No," Futaba sniffles, and looks away. Sojiro's heart lurches in his chest. "K-keep going. It's hard to hear, but I need to know..."

Akechi crosses his arms, silent for a moment, seemingly lost in thought. Sojiro doesn't miss how stiff his posture has gone, though, or the way he's only radiating more and more tension with each passing second, like the rumbling of a kettle that's about to boil over.

When he speaks again, his upper lip curls away from his teeth in a snarl, and his tone has turned caustic.

"That was the first mental shutdown, and of course, Shido was ecstatic, while I was… I was stuck, like a fucking moron!" Akechi hisses, his words coming out in a rush now. "And I knew exactly what would happen if I tried to leave... so I just kept digging this stupid fucking hole, deeper and deeper, getting more and more blood on my hands, because I thought that if I could at least put a bullet in his bald fucking head at the end of it all that maybe it would be worth it—"

"Goro, you don't have to—" Ren tries to interrupt, but Akechi ignores him and continues on anyway.

"And it became almost easy, the more I did it — you've all been to the Metaverse, you've fought the monsters that their shadows turn into. It's like a game. They don't even bleed! The only time it was ever difficult…" his voice cracks around the word, and he shares a wild, wounded look with Ren that makes Sojiro feel like he's witnessing something too intimate to be happening here, in front of an audience, "The only time it ever felt real, was the one time it wasn't."

"Goro…" Ren says quietly.

Ryuji looks back and forth between Akechi and Ren, his eyes almost bugging out of his head, and if he didn't already know what the nature of their relationship was... Well, Sojiro would be very surprised if he hasn't connected the dots now, after that little exchange.

"Then, of course, I fought you all on that cursed fucking ship, my father's shitty cognition of me showed up and made it very clear that my revenge had been unobtainable from the very beginning — and every horrific thing I'd done in pursuit of it, was for nothing!" Akechi laughs then, bitterly, and it makes the hair on the back of Sojiro's neck stand on end. "So, yes, Niijima, it's no wonder you can't make sense of it all, really — because it spiralled so far out of control that I can hardly make any fucking sense of it myself!"

Ren gets up off his stool entirely and pulls Akechi into a hug. The silence that follows is nearly suffocating.

Sojiro casts his eyes around the room, preparing himself for the worst, but he needn't have worried. Sure, one or two of the kids look shocked, and maybe there might have been a time when they'd have been angry, but he can see the compassion and sympathy in them now — even if they still look uncomfortable as hell.

"Does anyone need a refill?" Sojiro offers, and they all accept, clearly grateful for the distraction.

And as he goes around, topping up their drinks, the tension in the air dissipates a little, enough that he feels like he can breathe again, at least.

Ren returns to his seat, but he keeps his fingers firmly laced with Akechi's.

"Excuse me, everyone," Haru pipes up, and every head in the room turns to look at her. "I've spent a lot of time thinking about what I'd say to Akechi-kun, if I ever saw him again, and I'd like to say my piece. If that's okay with all of you."

There's a chorus of mumbled affirmatives and supportive (if concerned) words before she continues.

"Akechi-kun, before I start, I just want to say that I appreciate your honesty, and that even though I think that everything you did was reprehensible, and I'm not sure if I can ever forgive you, I've also come to find your situation somewhat... understandable," she pauses to take a sip of her coffee, hand shaking slightly as she returns the cup to its saucer. "I've had a lot of time to think about it — about what would have happened if my father had ever found out that I had the potential to awaken a Persona. And I know — in my heart — that if he could s-sell me off to a monster without batting an eye, then he would have had no issue with forcing me to do exactly what your father was forcing you to do."

And she's crying now. Sojiro wrings his hands in his dishrag and looks away. Which just leaves him looking directly at Akechi, who is sitting ramrod straight on the stool, watching Haru with a pained expression on his face.

"I would like to think that I'd have refused, of course, but I can't really know that, none of us know what we're truly capable of until we're pushed — or trapped, and I'm sure that if everyone here were to look inside of themselves, they would be able to admit that they might have made the same decisions that you did, if they had been forced into the same hopeless situation. So, Akechi-kun, I want you to know — even before I heard everything you had to say — that I place the blame for my father's murder entirely at Shido's feet. And even though, for the longest time, I thought that I should, or that I needed to — I don't hate you."

Going quiet, she dabs daintily at her face and nose with a polka dot handkerchief as Makoto wraps her arms around her and pulls her close.

"I'd fail a charisma check if I even tried to give a big speech like that," Futaba says with a shrug, "but, uh, same."

"What Haru said is true," Yusuke says, looking up from the complicated mosaic he's been making out of torn napkins, "I've often thought about how easily I could have gone down a similar path, had I not met all of you. The similarities between Madarame and Shido have not escaped me."

"Back when we went up against Kamoshida," Ren speaks up, "Morgana wasn't even sure if he would survive the change of heart—" Morgana meows something, but Ren holds up his hand. "But I still did it anyway. I hardly even thought twice about it, honestly… Ryuji was the only one who stood up and said that it was wrong."

"Yeah, man," Ryuji says, "but I still went along with it... y'know, coz we were balls to the wall."

"Ren, Ryuji, and Morgana were there, so they know… but just after we stole Kamoshida's treasure, I really did come close to destroying his shadow," Ann says quietly, making a show of checking her nails. "And I didn't spare him because it was the right thing to do, either. I wanted him to suffer for what he did to Shiho, and I felt like death was too easy for him."

Sojiro's eyebrows are currently in the vicinity of where his hairline was ten years ago. This conversation has certainly taken a turn.

"The stakes were never quite so high for me, before I had the support of everyone else," Makoto chimes in, "but I understand the concept of sunk-cost fallacy well enough, and I'm far too familiar with being used as a tool by corrupt adults to not have any empathy, or sympathy for your situation, Akechi-kun."

"I, ah, don't know what to say…" Akechi sounds uncomfortable, his voice strained. "But 'thank you' is as good a place as any to start, I suppose… and for what it's worth, I am sorry, for all of the pain I've caused you."

Sojiro is worried that suffocating quiet is going to take over the room again, but then Ann sighs dramatically and stretches her arms above her head.

"Can we talk about something less depressing now?" she asks, twirling one pigtail around her fingers, as if they hadn't just been having a conversation about how close some of them have come to killing people. Sojiro wonders idly if it's too early in the day to have a drink. "It's Ren's last day! This is totally not the vibe we should be leaving him with!"

"Well, I do have one last thing to say, and it's definitely about a happier subject," Makoto starts, smiling shyly, "Akechi-kun, I can't help but notice that you and Ren seem to be very… close this morning. I suppose that congratulations are in order?"

Ren is smiling too, although he also looks a little nervous. Akechi opens his mouth to speak, but before he can, Futaba loudly hums (and bangs out on the table) a few bars of a tune that Sojiro doesn't recognise. Going by the confused looks on everyone's faces, he's not the only one.

"What?" Futaba squawks. "You seriously don't know the victory theme from Penultimate Phantasy?! You guys suck!"

"What does that have to do with Akechi and Ren?" Ann asks, at the same time that Ryuji says, "Oooh, that's what that's from."

"Duh, I'm celebrating the fact that Makoto realised that these two dummies—" she jerks one thumb in Ren and Akechi's direction, "—finally resolved the whole 'rivals to lovers' thing they've had going on for forever!"

Ryuji stands up and crosses the short distance between them to yank Ren out of his seat and into a bear hug. "I'm happy for you, man." Sojiro can see that he's grinning as he pulls back, and how he only hesitates for a second before he claps Akechi on the shoulder for good measure. Maybe a little harder than he really needs to.

And they're all piling out of the booth now — Ann is next, looping an arm around each boy's neck in a hug that Ren returns easily, but Akechi seems entirely dumbstruck by. His hand just hovers over her back for a second before he settles for patting at her awkwardly a couple of times, clearly unsure of how to handle the sudden affection.

"I believe that I'll have to make some modifications to the piece I have been working on…" Yusuke mutters to himself, stepping to the side so that he can fit both of them in the frame he's making with his fingers. "Something to capture the intensity! The passion! Inherent in the nature of a relationship between former adversaries!"

"Ugh, do you have to be so weird about it, Inari?" Futaba groans, throwing a balled-up napkin at him. "And, gross, I don't want to think about their 'passion'."

Makoto and Haru go together, arms linked. Makoto repeats her earlier congratulations and gives Ren a quick one-armed hug that must rival Ryuji's in intensity, because Sojiro hears the 'oomph' sound the kid makes as he has the breath squeezed out of him.

Haru smiles a slightly wobbly smile, and her eyes are still red-rimmed, but her gaze is intense and sincere. "I'm overjoyed for the both of you, truly."

Ren's smiling from ear to ear. "Thanks, Haru."

"Thank you, Okumura," Akechi says, voice tellingly rough.

And that seems to do it. Sojiro wouldn't quite say that everything feels normal again, but it doesn't feel like he needs to brace himself against a bomb that's about to go off any second either.

Which is an improvement, whichever way you cut it.

"Do any of you kids want some curry? We're pushing up on lunchtime, and I'm guessing that most of you have been up longer than these two," he says, tipping his chin towards Akechi and Ren. "All this talking is hungry work."

"Curry would be wonderful, Boss." Yusuke is first out the gate, unsurprisingly. "Thank you."

The others are quick to follow, and Ren jumps up off his stool to come and help — though he stops on his way to the kitchen and turns back to Akechi. "Did you want something else to eat, Goro?"

"Why?" Akechi asks, clearly confused. "Why wouldn't I want some of Sakura-san's curry?"

"Uh, well, I helped to make it last night, and it might be a little on the spicy side…"

"And what would make you think that I have a problem with spicy food?"

"Bro," Ryuji laughs, and Akechi jolts in his seat. Futaba is snickering to herself, and Ren is clearly trying not to laugh too. "You don't think we bought your whole act with the takoyaki that time, right?"

"Yeah, you were totally obvious," Ann adds, with a giggle.

Sojiro has no idea what they're talking about (although, he can make a decent enough guess, from context), but he still knows what they're doing, thinking that a little good-natured ribbing will help to cement the fragile good cheer in the air.

He isn't sure that Akechi knows that, though.

"Ren." Akechi's gaze is bright, intense, and full of challenge. "Bring me some fucking curry."

Chapter Text

It would not be an exaggeration to say that it's been an extremely long time since Goro has had somewhere that even slightly felt like 'home' to him. Leblanc, though, has always been close, and possibly the only place other than Jazz Jin that he's ever felt in any way comfortable in. He's always loved the atmosphere here, a slightly dingy, retro charm that feels one thousand times more authentic than what could be found in any one of the fake-cutesy cafés he used to visit when he was still writing for his sham of a food blog — each one peddling their gimmick of the week, instead of learning how to actually make a halfway decent cup of coffee.

There are no more plots, no more schemes — nothing that might be jeopardised by allowing himself to admit that he's always been somewhat partial to the company here too, and Goro allows himself to think back to the last time he was here socially. One long, bittersweet evening in early November, spent indulging in ill-advised flirtation and trading barbs with Ren over a chessboard. If he closes his eyes, he can almost hear the soothing background noise of the rain that had been pitter-pattering against the window while they played.

When he has so few memories that could be considered positive at all, let alone happy, is it really any wonder that he's become attached to the place that's played host to so many of them?

And now, as he listens to the quaintly domestic sounds coming from Leblanc's kitchen (the clink of plates and cutlery, and the low hum of conversation between Sakura and Ren), he thinks about how he should be reassured by their familiarity.

Unfortunately, and because of nothing more than his own impulsive, competitive stupidity, he has to sit here, stewing in the knowledge that he's (most likely) going to make a complete and utter fool of himself.

In front of all the Phantom Thieves.

Again.

Trying to force himself to relax, he rests his elbows on the bar and leans forward over his cup of coffee. He inhales the steam along with the rich, bitter scent of the blend, as if it might coat his palate and protect it from whatever heavily spiced monstrosity Ren is going to be serving him.

It's the absolute height of melodrama, he knows, but it feels like he might as well be a doomed man on death row, awaiting his punishment. More nervous now, somehow, than he had been when he realised that he was going to have to be the one to bite the bullet and get the ball rolling on anything resembling a conversation between himself and the Phantom Thieves. Perhaps it was the fact that his hand had been forced, essentially, that made it easier — even if it was only by a small margin — when it became obvious that no one else was going to do it. When Ren had, apparently, decided to abandon his role as the Charismatic Leader to do his best impression of a pretty statue instead.

All while the rest of them had just sat there, staring at him dumbly.

And Goro is a public speaker, for fuck's sake! It really shouldn't have been as difficult as it was, but he's out of practice, and once he started actually talking... Well, things had very quickly snowballed into an impromptu summary of the complete shitshow that his life has been, ever since the day that he discovered the little red icon for the Meta-nav on the cracked screen of his second-hand phone.

Is it really any wonder that he's still reeling? Because if he thought that spilling his guts (for the second time over, no less!) to a group of people that he once would have called his enemies was a strange experience, then nothing could have prepared him for the absolutely mind-boggling show of solidarity that followed, as they all took turns in trying to empathise with his situation.

And that was before he stopped to think about the fact that the whole thing had been spearheaded by Okumura! Of all people!

He's still not sure how he feels about that.

Regardless, and while it may be difficult to understand, it is an easy, and welcome, distraction to get caught up in — thinking over the supremely awkward (but definitely less catastrophic than he'd expected) exchange that he just had with the group of teenagers that are happily chattering away amongst themselves in the booth behind him.

It's hard to say if it's because they're actually comfortable around him now, or if it's affected camaraderie for Ren's benefit. He has to remind himself sometimes that they're all better actors than they appear. They'd all been aware of what he'd been planning to do in Sae's Palace, and in that interrogation room afterwards, after all, and he hadn't noticed anything unusual about their behaviour then either.

Still, maybe it's because of how surreal everything has been, in the short time since he woke up in the Velvet Room, but he can't quite find it in himself to be more than mildly suspicious of them. Truly, he can't even begin to muster the energy needed for his usual level of paranoia, not when he's so mentally and emotionally fatigued.

And who could blame him? When every single time he thinks he's beginning to get a handle on things, something else comes along, kicks him in the ass, and upends his expectations all over again.

The very fact that he's sitting down again with the Phantom Thieves in Leblanc (when it's without the unifying force of an impending Palace deadline looming over them, specifically) is a perfect case in point, and probably ranks somewhere in the middle of the list of bizarre things that Goro thought would never happen. Not because it had ever seemed especially likely, mind you, but more because its competitors (Ren returning his feelings in any shape or form, the persistent content undercurrent to his mood that he's beginning to suspect may actually be something akin to happiness, or actually being alive) were all so ridiculous that this little gathering seems almost run-of-the-mill by comparison.

He's still trying to figure out how to engage with other people while he isn't simultaneously also trying to pull the wool over their eyes. An undertone of deception has become almost integral to his interactions with other people, and if he's being honest, it's also something that he's always derived a kind of enjoyment from. The rush of having some secret safely tucked away in his chest while he put on a shiny performance for whomever he was dealing with at the time. Whether it had been interviewers, classmates, Shido, the Phantom Thieves... Ren.

Something that would let him kid himself that he had the upper hand, even when he very much did not.

Unfortunately, this particular subset of people have already seen under his usual go-to façade (and called him out on it immediately, when he tried to hide behind it again, which was just fucking rude, if you ask Goro), and that made it harder than it might have been, under different circumstances, to keep things together.

At least in January, he'd been keeping the fact that he was dead (well, not really, but he had no way of knowing that at the time, had he?) from them, and that was a nice little diversion. Something to focus on. Instead of having to acknowledge that he does not know what the fuck he's doing when it comes to actually speaking with his... peers.

It's not as if he'd been given the opportunity to speak to them in some low-stakes situation either, no. He had to flex all of those atrophied social muscles while he regaled them with stories about just how much of a fuckup he is. And the more that he spoke, the more that his control of the situation (and the specific words leaving his mouth) started to feel tenuous at best.

Still, he thinks that he was doing a passable job of it, all things considered, right up until he was forced to remember the expression on Wakaba Isshiki's (or rather, her shadow's) face when he'd landed the final blow. All confused dismay and wide, yellow eyes, as she pulled uselessly at the hilt of the toy sabre lodged in her chest — his first sword — a cheap, plastic thing with a collapsible blade, made strong and sharp only through the power of sheer belief. Nothing could have prepared him for the way that it went through her, like a hot knife meeting butter. Particularly when, only seconds before, his weapon had been barely scratching the surface of the monstrous form she'd twisted herself into — a massive sarcophagus shadow that shrugged off Robin Hood's bless damage and soaked up Loki's curse skills like they were nothing. He's never seen a shadow quite like it again since, not in any Palace, or on any of the floors of Mementos.

Only having managed to defeat her by the skin of his teeth, he'd been so keyed up — so terrified — that he didn't even fully register when she shrunk back down into a more human form.

Not until he'd already skewered her on his blade.

Goro remembers holding his hands up and backing away from her, crying pathetically and babbling some nonsense apology. As if he could take it all back. She'd looked up to meet his eyes then, one last time, still seeming more perplexed by what had happened than anything else, and then she just... disintegrated into an anticlimactic cloud of black particles, and his sword had fallen to the ground with a hollow clatter.

It's something that he tries to avoid thinking about, for obvious reasons, along with the lengthy and spectacular panic attack that he'd had immediately afterwards. But if having to recall (and try to put into words) what happened with Isshiki was bad, then realising that Futaba Sakura was watching him with the exact same shocked and slightly wounded expression on her face was even worse. Before that moment, he'd never noticed just how much she's the spitting image of her mother, and there was a gut-churning second where he was almost convinced that the big, wet eyes blinking owlishly at him from behind her glasses were a bright sunflower yellow, instead of the mauve-brown that he knows they are in reality.

So, perhaps things had come out a little more honest, and a little more visceral than he might have liked, as he tried to explain things to them.

Being slightly sloppy is something that he feels he could be forgiven for (if nothing else); it's not as if he'd ever really spoken about any of it out loud before. Not in its entirety, at least.

Clenching his fists on the bar, Goro exhales slowly, trying to resist the urge to bite his nails, as he thinks again of their well-meaning attempts to step into his shoes and see things from his perspective. It makes him feel strange. He's used to framing the differences in their circumstances in a distinctly bitter light, always in terms of what they had received that he hadn't, and it's disorienting to have it all turned around on him and used as a connection through which they can relate to each other instead.

There has long been a deep melancholy inside of him (along with a vehement, poisonous jealousy), something that's only ever seemed to fester and grow whenever he found himself around the Phantom Thieves for any extended period of time. Perhaps it's something as simple as a desire to be able to wind back the clock and join them under more conventional circumstances, even if he still doesn't entirely agree with their methods. They had offered him a version of it in the engine room, after all, before his cognitive double had turned up and forced his hand, and he'd also had a small taste of it by fighting alongside them in Maruki's Palace… but it wasn't something that he thought he'd ever actually be able to have.

The idea that there could be a place for him here, or anywhere, even after everything he's done, is overwhelming. And he thinks that if it wasn't for his new relationship (they still haven't put a name on it. Goro isn't sure if that's a bad thing or a good thing) with Ren, he might even have rebuffed them out of reflex, or simple wariness. He's quickly realising just how much that fledgling bond with Ren feels like a lifeline. An anchor. Something that gives him the security to entertain the notion that maybe it wouldn't be so dangerous, or terrible, to actually allow other people to get close.

So he'd done his part, reached out and accepted their olive branch, steeled his nerves, and then thanked them for it. He'd even managed to apologise without putting his foot squarely into his mouth. Although perhaps it was a little closer than he'd like. Because while he is sorry for everything he's done to hurt the individuals in this room, he does not necessarily regret what happened to some of his more unpleasant victims. Kunikazu Okumura included. Goro doubts that clarifying his position on the matter would have been well-received.

Then, Niijima finally brought up the change in the nature of his relationship with Ren, and not a one of them had appeared especially surprised, but he supposes, that between Sakura's obvious allusions to it in the group chat this morning and Ren's maddeningly confident displays of physical affection, they would have to be blind and incredibly dim to have not noticed that something was going on. And once it was made clear that they all knew, he was then subjected to a nauseating (but, yes, alright, not entirely awful) procession of hugs and general good will, and he'd been left entirely confounded all over again.

Sakura and Ren both emerge from the kitchen then, and Goro's stomach does an unpleasant flip as he's pulled, kicking and screaming, from the refuge of his thoughts. Sakura is holding two plates, and Ren, being his usual show-off self, is carrying four, one in each hand and another pair resting precariously on his forearms. On closer inspection, Goro realises that he also has a small saucer tucked into the crook of his elbow, presumably with something on it for Morgana.

He makes it look effortless, and Goro can't decide if he's more annoyed or enamoured by Ren's ridiculous balancing act.

After they've delivered their volatile cargo to the crowd of teenagers (and one cat) in the booth, and finish waving off the veritable cacophony of 'thank you's that's bound to accompany a mountain of free food, Ren makes to turn back towards the kitchen. Not before he catches Goro's eye, though, of course, and drops him a cheeky little wink.

"Yours is coming right up, Goro, don't worry."

Oh, but he is insufferable — Goro only wishes that he had something to hand to throw at his cocky face. But alas, the napkins beside him aren't aerodynamic enough to cross the distance, and he feels that he might be really testing Sakura's hospitality if he were to lob his coffee cup across the bar.

"I can hardly wait," he replies instead, smoothly, and smiles like he isn't currently being crushed under the weight of the impending consequences of his own rash decision. Which at least comes easily. It's something that he's had a lot of practice with, after all.

Not taking nearly long enough in the kitchen before he reappears again, Ren makes his way back to his stool and sets two steaming servings of curry down on the bar.

Goro peers down at his plate with a sickly mixture of dread and suspicion.

It certainly doesn't seem any different from Sakura's usual curry (which he's only had once or twice, and while it wasn't exactly his cup of tea, it was at least edible), but he supposes that he was being foolish for expecting any different... It isn't as if it would actually be glowing red, or smoking ominously — signalling its spiciness in some ridiculously cartoonish way.

Narrowing his eyes, he sniffs delicately, carefully. The smell might be a little more acrid than he's used to, but that could also just be his nerves getting the better of him.

Well, he thinks (pointedly ignoring the way that Ren is watching him expectantly from the corner of his eye), there's no point in delaying the inevitable.

Swallowing his trepidation, Goro reaches out to pick up his spoon and scoops up a generous amount of rice to go with the curry, in the hopes that it might help to temper any... unpleasantness lurking in the sauce.

He can feel the eyes on him as he puts it into his mouth.

The first couple of seconds, however, are deceptively underwhelming. The flavour is fruity and slightly tart, not dissimilar to the curry that he's had here before, and he's even allowing himself to appreciate the texture and tenderness of the beef when the pain kicks in.

And fuck! His mouth suddenly feels like it's on motherfucking fire!

Sweat breaks out in little beads along his hairline as wave after wave of terrible prickling heat ravages the tender flesh of his tongue, the inside of his cheeks, and the back of his nose. As if he'd just bitten into a mouthful of wasps, or fire ants, instead of an innocuous-looking spoonful of curry.

He starts to blink away the water in his eyes, but immediately thinks better of it (what if a tear slips free, and it looks like he's actually crying?), and he grabs a napkin to dab surreptitiously at his eyes and nose (which is also beginning to run. Fantastic!), as he forces himself to swallow. There's no grace period when he puts the second spoonful in his mouth either, the burning pain is immediate and intense this time, and he supposes that probably has something to do with his unfortunate taste buds being scorched to within an inch of their lives by the culinary equivalent of a fucking Agidyne.

There is a slight silver lining, though. While this curry is hot, it's becoming rapidly apparent that it's nowhere near Shujin-Culture-Festival-Takoyaki hot. Which at the very least means that he won't be having to run to the nearest bathroom just to preserve what remains of his dignity.

It hurts, it does, but it's not as if he hasn't had to endure far worse, and with that in mind, he finds that if he focuses on the mechanics of what he's doing, instead of the pain, it becomes easier. Marginally. Just chew, swallow, discretely wipe away any erstwhile liquid that tries to make a break for it from his eyes or his nose. Rinse and repeat.

It's not long before he notices that Ren isn't even trying to hide the fact that he's openly staring anymore, looking equal parts amused and concerned as Goro robotically shoves spoonful number six into his mouth. The other Phantom Thieves have all gone very quiet as well, and while Goro can't see them, he's sure that if he were to turn and look, he'd catch them gawking too.

His suspicions are immediately confirmed when Sakamoto snickers and does that thing where he speaks at a normal volume, but obviously thinks that he's whispering. "He looks like he's about two seconds away from havin' smoke comin' outta his ears, right?"

He hears Futaba Sakura laugh, and then the sound of Takamaki trying to hide her own tittering behind a painfully fake cough.

And under more normal circumstances, where Goro didn't feel like his head was being fucking fried, he might have been able to come up with a suitably witty and scathing reply. "Eat shit, Sakamoto," is what he sneers instead, and then winces, both at how raspy and congested it comes out, and because of how stupidly petulant that comeback (if it could even be called that) sounds.

Expecting an angry outburst in response, Sakamoto surprises him by just making an indignant squawking noise that's immediately followed by more of them laughing again, louder, and more open this time — with Ren joining in with his friends. Goro's gut reaction is to assume that they're making fun of him, and, bristling in his seat, he bites and chews at the inside of his cheek until the metallic twang of blood joins the miasma of spice flooding his senses.

It hardly registers, however — the only taste in his mouth now is something sharp and bitter.

But then Ren reaches out and squeezes his hand. Goro starts a little at the contact, eyes snapping up from where they were fixated on the plate to meet Ren's. He does look amused, yes, but the smile on his face and the twinkle in his eye don't seem mean-spirited — and Goro knows, logically, that a little teasing is normal between… friends.

There's a thunk on the bar then, and Goro nearly jumps again. A glass of milk is now in front of him. Courtesy, of course, of one Sojiro Sakura. "Here, Kid, drink up. You look like you could use it."

There's a complicated and confusingly warm feeling in his chest that has nothing to do with the heat of the curry.

It takes him a second to recognise that it's because Sakura just referred to him as 'Kid' in that brusquely kind tone that he usually reserves for when he's talking to Ren, or one of the many other teenagers here that he's decided to take under his wing.

Brain stuttering and screeching to a halt at the realisation, Goro rushes to compartmentalise it away. Crushing it into a tiny ball and throwing it into some distant part of his mind, where he won't have to examine it. With that taken care of, at least for now, he mutters his thanks awkwardly and reaches for the glass of milk.

The first sip is like a balm on the abused interior of his mouth, cool and soothing, and it takes a not-inconsiderable amount of willpower to drink at a normal pace, rather than just gulp down the entire thing in seconds and make himself look even more foolish than he already has.

"I think," Ren starts, and there's still an undercurrent of mirth in his voice, but he's also rubbing a distractingly pleasant circle with his thumb on the back of Goro's hand, so he decides not to hold it against him, "you've made your point."

They both know — hell, probably every single person in the room knows — that he didn't really have a point to begin with (he'd just jumped the second he'd seen even a glimpse of challenge in the quirk of Ren's lips, like an idiot), but he recognises the graceful 'out' that he's being offered, and he takes it, gladly.

"I suppose I have," he says, and pushes the plate away from him slightly. The curry is only about a third gone, but the idea of trying to choke down the rest of it in a renewed bout of stubbornness is extremely unappealing.

"So, Akechi," Sakura starts, clearing his throat as he leans forward to pick up Goro's plate, though he doesn't make any move to bring it back to the kitchen. "What are you planning on doing now?"

Goro can almost hear the record scratch as the atmosphere shifts abruptly back to something tense. Without meaning to, he finds his eyes sliding to meet Ren's, whose expression has turned solemn, all and any trace of his earlier amusement chased away by the reality of the situation.

Twisting in his seat so that he's facing Ren properly, their knees bump lightly against each other, and he spares a fleeting moment to appreciate the way they instinctively slot their legs together — instead of awkwardly trying to make room for each other.

"I'm going to turn myself in, of course," Goro says carefully, and Ren flinches like he's been slapped.

Fuck.

This really isn't how he wanted to do this.

Chapter Text

Haru Okumura sits, dwarfed by the too-big couch, in the too-big living room, of her too-big and far too empty home. The television is on, the cheery commercials filling what would be an otherwise unbearable quiet. The white noise is added to by the fireplace (real, not electric. Her father had insisted), where kindling crackles softly as it burns.

Low and bright, the sun streams through the large bay window to her left, but there's no heat in it, and she can see the powder sugar dusting of snow on the grass in the garden outside. Haru's sure that if she were to go out there and check, she would find that the shallow pool of water in the stone birdbath is frozen over too.

At a glance, she can tell that her flower beds are dormant and lifeless, the soil frosty and hard, months away from playing host to the first green shoots of spring.

But wait...

She frowns, then shakes her head.

Something doesn't feel right.

Hasn't she been tending the new growth in her garden for weeks now?

It's far too cold out there for it to be late March, like she knows it is — too cold even for February — and, as if to confirm her suspicions, a tinkly, festive version of the Junes jingle plays over an advertisement on the television.

Oh.

Apparently, it's December.

Is this a dream?

A memory?

Both?

Haru's hands flex in her lap, where they're clutching a slightly damp handkerchief, as if she's been crying.

It's another piece of the puzzle, helping her to place this dream in the first half of December, specifically, back when she'd been having an especially hard time.

In reality — in the springtime after the winter where she and her friends defeated the man responsible for her father's death, and then went on to save the world twice over — she's still in mourning. She knows that she'll probably never be truly done, really, that she'll spend the rest of her life grieving for her father, as well as for all of the people that he hurt with his single-minded ambition…

And perhaps it's selfish, but when it comes to her father, the thing that she finds herself grieving for, more than anything else, is the second chance that she'd hoped to have with him after his change of heart.

That wound had been far more fresh in December — had barely started to heal at all, in fact — but truthfully, that wasn't the only reason that she had been crying, was it?

The girl who sat in this spot, on this couch, and cried these tears, might still be raw from the loss of her father, but that's not all. She's also dealing with the sting of rejection and embarrassment after she gathered up every scrap of courage that she had and tried to tell Ren how she felt about him.

And maybe she hadn't been able to come right out and say it, technically — using President Takakura's assumptions about their relationship as a starting point, instead of taking time to plan a proper confession — but Ren had obviously still understood what she was driving at. Why else would he have become so evasive? An awkward (but kind, because Ren has always been kind to her) sadness in his eyes as he sidestepped her clumsy hints with the kind of grace she'd come to expect from him. Both in the Metaverse and in the insightful way he'd been helping her navigate the viper's nest that was her father's business.

Yes, she's almost positive now; this memory — or this dream — is taking place on the twelfth of December. Only a handful of days after Ren made it clear that her love was unrequited, and precisely one day before they went into Shido's Palace to acquire the last letter of introduction.

Which, of course, also happened to be the day before Akechi confronted them in the engine room of that ship, tried to kill them, and then proceeded to sacrifice himself for them.

All in the space of about twenty minutes.

That was when Haru had gotten her first real inkling, that first little spark of clarity, as she watched Ren almost collapse in front of the closed bulkhead door, and saw the unshed tears in his eyes when they turned to flee. It only occurred to her then that maybe the reason he hadn't been able to return her feelings was because he was already in love with someone else.

Ren is the best of them — out of all the Phantom Thieves, he's the kindest and the strongest. Always their rock. Their port in a storm. The shoulder they cry on when the world has been unkind to them.

It's a rare thing to see Ren let himself be anything other than that, anything other than their reliable leader.

To allow himself to be vulnerable.

If she'd still had any doubts about Akechi being the one, out of all of them, that Ren had fallen for… Well, they were well and truly dispelled when he'd broken down in February — fresh out of juvenile detention, and at nothing more than the mere mention of the other boy's name.

On the television, the commercials have ended, and Haru looks up just as the room is filled with the excited chatter of the hosts of one of those talk shows. The kind that are concerned with celebrity gossip and not much else. The kind that her mother used to love so much.

Haru knows that she's not watching this one out of a sense of nostalgia. Or sentiment.

No, it's only because the special guest on this morning's episode is Goro Akechi.

That's how she can be so sure of the date, having made it her own little mission to tune in for all of his appearances after the twentieth of November, watching each one carefully for any sign that he'd realised they tricked him.

And in this dream, just as she had in reality, she listens to him talk about how instrumental he was in capturing and arresting the leader of the infamous Phantom Thieves. Unlike when this happened in reality, though, she has no rush of vindication for knowing that Ren is safe at home.

It's harder to paint the boy on the screen as a villain when she knows everything she knows now.

About Akechi himself, and about Ren's feelings for him.

The audience 'oooh' and 'aaah' in all the right places before he silences them with a raised hand. She watches as he folds his hands neatly in his lap (almost mirroring her own position exactly) and twists his face into an unnervingly convincing show of sympathy.

"I only wish that I could have stopped them before so many people were hurt or ki-"

He stops abruptly, stricken, his expression suddenly forced into something sincere by sheer animal panic. Goosebumps prickle over Haru's skin at the sudden deviation from real-life events, and her stomach lurches as his pretty eyes roll back into their sockets, leaving only the whites visible. Thick, black fluid bubbles up from between his lips, and runs from his tear ducts in a steady stream. Gasping wetly, he scrabbles at his throat with clawed fingers that leave rows of angry red welts in their wake.

Haru sits, frozen in place, simultaneously on the couch in her living room and standing in Destiny Land. Watching both this talk show and her father's press conference. It all begins to blur as Akechi chokes and drowns on live television, until the front of his shirt and blazer are soaked through with that tar-like gunge — until he has nothing left — until he slumps sideways in his seat, bonelessly, like a puppet with its strings cut.

Akechi convulses once, twice, and then goes very, very still.

Both the hosts and the audience are clapping and laughing, like they would if he had just told an especially charming joke.

Haru's eyes well up and her eyelids flutter several times, rapidly — as if doing so could make the horrific image in front of her disappear, but all that it really achieves is dislodging one of the tears that's obscuring her vision. It slips down the side of her nose to pool uncomfortably in the corner of her mouth, and without really thinking about it, she brings her handkerchief up to her face, dabbing carefully and gently at the wet trail there, making sure to be mindful of her make-up.

Father didn't pay all that money for her to go to finishing school just for her to start being sloppy now, after all.

Her stomach flip-flops again.

It seems as if she's unable to escape his expectations of her, even in her own dreams.

The hysterical laugh that twists her mouth and squirms in her lungs dies before it can escape her throat, because the handkerchief comes away from her face sticky and stained. A pitch-black smear of the same viscous liquid that she just saw erupt from the boy on the screen stands out in stark contrast against the white fabric.

Eyebrows knitted together, she blinks in disbelief, and another inky drop lands just below the streak, making it look like an exclamation point — an accusation.

She blinks again, and everything turns black.

Haru jolts awake in her bed, rocketing up into a sitting position and kicking out wildly. With bile in her throat, and (blessedly normal) tears on her cheeks, she wrenches herself free of the blankets tangled around her legs, and stumbles into her en-suite.

She's not sure how long she stays there, sitting on the tiled floor, slumped over the toilet, her silk pyjamas doing nothing to protect her from the cold seeping into her bones, as she hyperventilates and waits for a surge of vomit that never comes.

It's just as well, really. Some panicked, irrational part of her brain is convinced that it would come up thick and black.

When she's collected herself enough to actually try to think straight again — when she doesn't feel like her consciousness is like a balloon filled with helium that's only loosely tethered to her body, she lifts one shaky and heavy-feeling arm to check her watch.

It's just shy of seven.

She supposes that she should probably get up and start the day. There's no school today, so she doesn't really have to, but she can't imagine getting back into bed now. Not with the spectre of that nightmare still hanging over her.

Back in her room, her eyes land on her bedside table, drawn to where her phone is still plugged in. There's a notification light blinking on it, which isn't unusual — she's used to waking up to a slew of messages in the group chat she shares with her friends. Mostly eccentric arguments between Futaba and Yusuke at odd hours, sometimes joined by Ryuji when he's up early for a run.

Taking a moment to read back over whatever her friends were talking and joking about together feels like just the thing to help her feel a little more normal again. So she makes a beeline for her phone, sitting down on the edge of her bed as she unplugs it and makes the screen come to life.

Even just the sight of her lock-screen helps to lift her spirits. It's a picture of all of them in Ren's room, crammed onto and around his small couch. Ann is in the centre, her arm extended upwards, holding Haru's phone above them — happily having taken over as photographer when Haru couldn't quite squeeze all nine of them into the frame. It's still a close thing, even with Ann's selfie-expertise, some of their faces are cut-off slightly, and Haru can see the way that Ryuji is half laughing, half wincing where one of Futaba's elbows is, no doubt, buried somewhere in his ribs.

Everyone looks so happy.

It's hard to believe that today is Ren's last full day in Tokyo.

Haru runs the pad of her thumb over where he is in the picture, squashed right up beside Ann, with Yusuke looming behind him and Mona perched on his shoulder. There is still a slightly painful tug in her chest when she looks at Ren, and at the small smile on his handsome face, but it's getting better. Easier. More and more each day.

Still, her eyes linger on him for another second before she keys in her pass-code, and the picture disappears.

The screen flickers and stutters strangely for a second before her messaging app opens without her touching the icon. Haru has a panicky moment where she's worried that she's somehow done something to break it, but then Futaba's Alibaba avatar (the funny little cat-bomb with the toothy grin) pops up in the centre of the screen, with a small loading bar underneath it.

Haru sighs in relief.

But when the screen returns to normal, she realises that whatever Futaba did; she made it so Haru can't open any chat threads, or even back out of the app. She taps aimlessly around the screen, trying to get any response, but nothing seems to work. It's just when she's starting to become properly frustrated that a new thread opens by itself.

It's definitely from Futaba, but the chat window looks strange, and the date and time fields are blank.

-Alibaba-
00/00/0000
0:00

Alibaba: hi Haru!
Alibaba: sorry 4 hijacking ur phone like this
(￣▽￣*)ゞ
Alibaba: u need a heads up about something that happened last nite
Alibaba: theres no easy way to say it
Alibaba: so maybe sit down
Alibaba: and ill just infodump

Haru's heart is suddenly in her throat, a plethora of awful 'maybe's flying through her head, as she swallows and keeps reading.

Alibaba: so...
Alibaba: sum weird velvet room stuff happened
(/￣ー￣)/~~☆'.･.･:★'.･.･:☆
Alibaba: and turns out that Akechi isnt dead
Alibaba: hes back
Alibaba: again

While she doesn't know exactly what she was expecting, it certainly wasn't that…

Bewildered, she finds herself just staring down at the screen, rereading the words over and over again, hoping they'll start to actually make sense.

Because what are the chances that something like this would happen when she just woke up from that awful dream?

Alibaba: were all talking about it in the nov group chat
Alibaba: he just messaged us out of nowhere
Alibaba: at like 5 am…
Alibaba: so i had 2 get ahead of it
Alibaba: and warn u
Alibaba: take ur time
Alibaba: but wen ur ready click the link at the bottom
Alibaba: itll unlock ur phone again
Alibaba: and Haru…
Alibaba: hmu if u need 2 talk

For a couple of seconds she's genuinely tempted to just turn the phone off entirely and go back to sleep after all, but taking a deep breath instead, she counts backwards from ten, exhales slowly, and then starts typing. She tries to reply first, but her 'thank you, Futaba-chan' won't send, and she just gets an error message back that says the number she's trying to contact doesn't exist.

There's no delaying it then, she supposes. And with another deep breath for good measure, Haru taps the link before she can think better of it.

Her screen flickers again (the way it did earlier), the Alibaba chat disappears, and her phone really does go back to normal.

And sure enough, just like Futaba said, she has notifications for their group chat from November. New replies are still coming in now, in fact. Knowing that her friends are in there, talking amongst themselves, gives her the courage to open it and scroll upwards, until she finds the first unread reply.

-Casino Heist 🃏 Jokers are Wild-
19/03/2017
5:43 a.m.

Akechi: Thank you.

Obviously, Futaba warned her that he was back, but she wasn't really prepared to have the proof of it staring her right in the face. It takes longer than it probably should for her to register that she's crying again. She really hadn't noticed at all, despite how blurry her vision had gone, until a big, fat tear landed right in the middle of the screen. It's followed by another, and then another, until the droplets start to confuse the touch screen when she tries to scroll down. Wiping at her phone with the cuff of her sleeve, she dries it as best she can before taking a second to do the same to her wet face and eyes.

She can't help but frown at how badly her hands are trembling.

In the grand scheme of things, this isn't really all that strange compared to some of the other experiences she's had in the six-odd months that she's been a Phantom Thief, so Haru's not even really sure why she's feeling so shaken.

It's only when she looks back to the screen, and starts trying to read again, that she realises a large part of the emotional turmoil inside of her is relief, of all things. Maybe it's because she just woke up from a truly horrific nightmare where she had a front-row seat to Akechi dying horribly, but she really is just so relieved that he's actually alive.

And she doesn't know how she's supposed to feel about that.

At all.

Only that it almost feels like a betrayal of her father... to be glad that the boy who destroyed him is okay — even while she knows, logically, that Shido is his actual murderer. It's ludicrous, but she just can't shake the feeling that her father disapproves of how she's feeling, somehow. To the point that she can almost see his critical expression. The way he used to stare her down when she did, or said something that he was unhappy with — the judgemental set of his jaw as he looked down his nose at her.

Heat blooms in her chest, and she knows that it's her Persona, Lucy, flaring up at the very thought.

No.

It doesn't matter what Father would have said, or felt. She will not be made to feel guilty, or small, for being kind, or trying to be a good person.

Never again.

Resolve renewed, she gets back to catching up with the rest of the messages, eyebrows going up in surprise when she reads that most of her friends had dreams about Akechi last night too (none seem to have been as unpleasant as hers, though, thankfully), and the only one that didn't (Futaba) had at least been thinking of him. Still, despite her surprise, she finds herself nodding along when Makoto puts forward her ideas about 'actualisation', and then with Futaba's efforts to make it easier for everyone to understand.

That's it. She's up-to-date now, and she can't help but notice that Akechi hasn't reappeared. Not once. Ren, for his part, has also been absent from the chat entirely… though Haru knows him well enough to assume that probably has more to do with the early hour, rather than anything else.

Yusuke and Ann chime in now, thanking Futaba for her explanation, and when Ryuji starts replying as well, Haru assumes, at first, that he's just doing the same, but he asks a question that prompts Futaba to share a little more information about Ren's circumstances than she has so far.

Ryuji: i think i get it
Ryuji: kinda
Ryuji: but like
Ryuji: Akechi just appeared in leblanc right?
Ryuji: is Ren ok?

Futaba: ∠( ᐛ 」∠)_

Ryuji: huh?

Futaba: Ren is fine
(￢‿￢ )

Haru goes very still, fresh trepidation prickling through her as she holds her breath.

Makoto: That's a relief.

Ann: Oh, Ren is fine? 👀

Futaba: Ann gets me

The air in Haru's lungs rushes out all at once, in a shaky rattle that's only a stone's throw away from a sob, and her eyes are watering again.

She has the presence of mind to be angry with herself, because she loves Ren deeply, but not selfishly — and she is happy for him. But the thing is, despite all of that, it also just so happens to feel like someone has reached into her chest and has her heart in a vice grip.

But her friends don't know that, and the messages keep coming, so Haru sniffles, wipes at her eyes again (more roughly this time), and does her best to focus on them, instead of her bruised feelings.

Yusuke: What is there to get?

Ryuji: yeah im lost

Makoto: I'm not sure that I understand what you're referring to either.

Ann: It's not for us to say 😅

"Oh, Mako-chan…" she whispers to herself, with a small but genuine laugh, and even if it does come out sounding wet and somewhat deflated, it gives her the push to put on a brave face (so to speak) and actually type a reply of her own.

Haru: Good morning! 💕
Haru: Thank you, Futaba-chan, and everyone.
Haru: For worrying about me.
Haru: It was certainly a shock.
Haru: But maybe less of a shock than it would have been if this was the first time that Akechi-kun reappeared after we thought that he had died?

Futaba: thats fair

Haru: Of course, I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
Haru: But I am glad that Akechi-kun is alive, and I'm very happy for Ren-kun if he and Akechi-kun have finally "resolved their differences".
Haru: Especially since he's going home so soon.

And as she hits 'send' on that last line, she finds that everything she wrote really does ring true, that under all of the sadness and the pain, she is honestly overjoyed on Ren's behalf. That, at the end of the day, the most that she could ever really want — if they can't be together — is for the one she loves to be happy.

Maybe there's something freeing in it too, to not be clutching at that frayed thread of hope forever... wishing for a day when Ren stops waiting for a ghost, and might finally look her way.

The chat quickly dissolves into them all checking in with her, in their own ways, to make sure that she's okay. They, of course, are worried about her because of what happened to her father, but that's something that she's mostly made her peace with — especially after January. There was something about getting her father back, losing him all over again, and then having to fight side-by-side with Akechi, that had made her have to come to terms with her feelings on the matter rather quickly.

They don't know what's really bothering her. How could they? Haru has never spoken to any of them about her feelings for Ren — not even Makoto. And really, what would have been the point? When so many of them were probably in the same boat?

And she's certainly in no rush to tell them about that terrible dream, either.

So she does her best to assure them that she's going to be fine, and eventually the conversation shifts. First, to arranging a meetup in Leblanc just before lunchtime, and then to Futaba teasing Ryuji about his efforts to spend time with Makoto. Haru wonders if she should pull her best friend aside and tell her outright that Ryuji quite clearly likes her, or if she should go to Ryuji instead and tell him to be more direct. Makoto might be the smartest person Haru knows, but she can also be so incredibly dense sometimes.

And if nothing else, trying to figure out how to help her friends is a pleasant distraction from her own issues.

It makes her wonder if she might have that in common with Ren.

Excusing herself from the chat, once she's satisfied that they're satisfied, Haru gets started on her morning routine.

Honestly, it all passes in a bit of a haze, as she eats a breakfast that she barely tastes (of course, she doesn't tell the housekeeper that, and makes sure to thank her for preparing such a delicious meal), and spends most of her shower, and the time it takes to water her plants, running through what she wants to say to Akechi when she actually sees him.

She's still turning the speech over and over in her mind when her driver leaves her at the train station in Yongen-Jaya. It's where she's supposed to meet up with the others, so that they can all walk to Leblanc together. Stopping only to double-check her face in her compact mirror (her eyes are still a bit red, but there's not much she can do about that, unfortunately), she heads inside to find her friends.

It's not hard to spot them, waiting over by the vending machines. The station isn't especially big or busy, but their group always sticks out like a sore thumb anyway, even in crowded places.

Ann catches sight of her first, and Haru waves as she makes her way over to the rest of the group.

"Haru!" Ann cries, raising a hand to wave back, although her cheery smile turns noticeably stiff around the edges when she gets a proper look at Haru.

Goodness, is it really that obvious?

Perhaps she wasn't quite prepared for how much harder it was going to be to convince them that she's okay when she has to actually look them all in the eye, rather than just reassuring them through text.

Ryuji shuffles awkwardly, scratching at the back of his neck. "Mornin' Haru."

"Ah!" Yusuke jolts and turns from where he was examining something in one of the vending machines. "Greetings, Haru."

"Good morning, everyone."

"Haru…" Makoto starts, reaching out to take her hand. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm fine, Mako-chan," she replies, squeezing Makoto's hand for emphasis. She doesn't look convinced; none of them do, but Haru just smiles through it and pushes on. "Really — I promise."

Makoto's expression is tight and pinched with worry. "If you're sure…"

"I am," Haru says, and it comes out clear and strong, because she is sure that this is something that she wants to do. That she needs to do. "Shall we go?"

And Haru is worried for a second that they're all going to double down and really try to convince her to sit it out anyway. But then the moment passes, and they all leave the station together.

While Haru is confident in her decision, she still appreciates the way that Makoto and Ryuji flank her protectively while they walk, and how Ann and Yusuke walk slightly ahead, as if they're scouting for enemies in the Metaverse.

Some people might feel offended (or like they're being coddled) at being treated this way, but Haru knows that it's coming from a place of love, and she's just happy and grateful to have friends that care about her so much. It really wasn't that long ago that she'd had nothing more than acquaintances, after all — each one hand-selected by her father as being 'suitable'. Something that usually just meant that they were people with connections that he was interested in, such as the daughter of a businessman, or the son of a politician…

Sugimura's leering face flashes through her mind as they finally reach Leblanc, and Haru has to repress a shiver.

It's a bit of a squeeze, fitting through the café's doorway with Makoto and Ryuji still glued to her on either side, but they manage it, somehow — although it does put her in the unfortunate position of being made very aware of the fact that they've both been on a run this morning, and haven't yet had a chance to shower. Being boxed in as she is, distracted by her slightly smelly friends, and stuck behind Ann and Yusuke (neither of whom could be considered short), means that she doesn't actually realise that Akechi is sitting at the bar almost directly in front of them, until Ann moves just enough for her to catch a glimpse of him.

The sight of him is a shock to her system, as if she just had a cold drink thrown in her face, and, truthfully, she might have actually recoiled if she had the room for it.

It's another thing that she wasn't really prepared for how much more difficult it would be in person. Seeing him in the flesh is one thing, but seeing him dishevelled and wearing Ren's clothes is something else entirely. It's like the start of her dream again, the sorrow of her father's loss mixing into an unpleasantly bitter cocktail with the heartache of having what she can never hope to have rubbed in her face.

And she can't even be angry about it, because it hurts, but she still can't find it in herself to truly blame Akechi for any of it.

Sometimes she thinks that being petty might be easier.

Ren comes out of the kitchen then, smiling maybe a little too wide. He's clearly nervous — uncharacteristically so — but that isn't what Haru's focused on. Underneath all that anxious energy, he's nearly glowing, and that makes the painful knot in her chest ease slightly.

Things get off to a rocky start, somewhat, when she slides into the booth to sit down across from Futaba, and the rest of them decide to come with her. Leaving them all cramped and miserable, in addition to the oppressive (but not unexpected) silence. It's not hopeless though, because between Akechi and Makoto (the only people here with any real public speaking experience), the conversation does actually get going, eventually, even if that awkward silence is almost like another person in the room, waiting patiently to take its turn again.

Haru mostly keeps her eyes on the table in front of her while the others ask questions and Akechi answers, trying not to think about how much it's like an interview, and what happened the last time she saw him give one... even if it was just a dream.

Truthfully, she doesn't really have any great need to hear what he has to say now. What he'd said to them in the engine room, and speaking with Shido's shadow before their battle, had told her everything she needed to know about his circumstances.

She doesn't need the specifics to know what it's like to have to twist yourself into something you're not, breaking and reshaping every bone in your body until there was almost nothing of you left. All in an attempt to make yourself into someone who could be considered useful, or valuable, because that was all that men like her father, and Shido, really cared about.

Just like she's far too familiar with how easy it is to convince yourself, as you bend over backwards to be accommodating, that the occasional backhanded compliments and meagre morsels of approval that get thrown your way are acceptable substitutes for love and affection.

Haru wonders if Yusuke is thinking the same thing.

There's another lull in the conversation after Akechi is apparently finished talking, and Haru looks up just as Ren rises to embrace him. She can see enough of Akechi's face, over Ren's shoulder, to know that he's struggling to keep it together in the face of such an easy and open show of tenderness.

It's the first time since all of this started that she realises that she's actually happy for Akechi too.

Someone like Ren, who can accept him for who he is, with all of his faults, is exactly what he needs.

And if he is to be an important part of Ren's life, then they'll all need to make a space for him in theirs too. For some of her friends, that will be easier said than done, she knows — Makoto and Ryuji, in particular, are focused entirely on whether his presence in their group is an issue for Futaba and herself.

Futaba, for her part, has already made it clear that she wants to try. Haru supposes that means that it's her turn now.

So she opens her mouth and finally speaks.

"Akechi-kun, before I start, I just want to say that I appreciate your honesty, and that even though I think that everything you did was reprehensible, and I'm not sure if I can ever forgive you, I've also come to find your situation somewhat... understandable." Feeling her voice wanting to wobble, she pauses to take a sip of her coffee. "I've had a lot of time to think about it — about what would have happened if my father had ever found out that I had the potential to awaken a Persona. And I know — in my heart — that if he could s-sell me off to a monster without batting an eye, then he would have had no issue with forcing me to do exactly what your father was forcing you to do."

The words leave her in a flood, but thankfully, she's practised them so much that the basic structure of her speech remains intact. Despite her trembling hands, and the inevitable tears that she just cannot seem to shake today.

And if she derives a little bit of sadistic satisfaction from how clearly uncomfortable he is with the fact that she empathises with him… Well, no one needs to know that, do they?

"I would like to think that I'd have refused, of course, but I can't really know that, none of us know what we're truly capable of until we're pushed — or trapped, and I'm sure that if everyone here were to look inside of themselves, they would be able to admit that they might have made the same decisions that you did, if they had been forced into the same hopeless situation. So, Akechi-kun, I want you to know — even before I heard everything you had to say — that I place the blame for my father's murder entirely at Shido's feet. And even though, for the longest time, I thought that I should, or that I needed to — I don't hate you."

The relief that she feels for finally getting all of that off her chest is so overwhelming that if she wasn't already crying, it probably would have been the thing to set her off. Makoto reaches out to her, and Haru sinks into her arms gratefully, concentrating on the grounding sound of her friend's steady breathing.

The rest of them rush to pick up where she left off, and her heart swells with emotion again when she realises that not only do they not have an issue with what she said, they clearly agree with her too.

Everyone says their piece, and Akechi thanks them (presumably for their understanding) and apologises — for the hurt that he caused, and not, Haru notices, for what he's done.

She finds that there's something about that distinction that she respects, oddly enough.

Then Makoto brings up the fact that Ren and Akechi are clearly involved with each other, romantically, and Haru has an irrational moment where she feels betrayed, of all things. As if Makoto could have been considerate of the feelings that she doesn't know Haru has.

So she pushes through, and watches them all offer their good wishes, until it's her turn again. Haru is just incredibly grateful that everyone will assume that the way that her voice trembles when she speaks is because of her father, and not because she's terrified that she's going to burst into tears again over the simple fact that the boy she's in love with is holding someone else's hand.

"I'm overjoyed for the both of you, truly," she says, and hopes that they know how much she means it.

When everyone is back in their seats, and lunch is served, she's almost jealous of how easily they all slip back into their usual friendly banter. She tries to join in, as best she can, and she does get a laugh out of the entire curry debacle, but her heart isn't really in it.

It has been an extremely trying day, after all, and it's still only lunchtime.

Maybe that's why she doesn't seem to suffer the same emotional whiplash that everyone else does when Akechi drops his little dramatic bomb.

"I'm going to turn myself in, of course."

She sees the way that Ren goes wide-eyed, mouth dropping open into a little 'o' of surprise, as what was just said sinks in.

And then he just looks lost.

For the first time today, Haru feels a bright flash of genuine anger flicker through her, and it's aimed entirely at Akechi.

Chapter Text

Ren has been having a pretty weird morning so far.

Don't get him wrong; it's also been amazing.

But still... it's, uh, definitely been strange.

The thing is, for better or worse, his year in Tokyo has made him pretty familiar with 'strange' by now. It helps that he's also kind of gotten used to it working out in his favour, mostly, and the last ten hours have been no exception.

Ren brought Goro back from the Velvet Room (and into his bedroom), and he's been riding high ever since. Like a gambler on a winning streak, feeling blessed and invincible, as the stars seem to go out of their way to align themselves in such a way that everything gets tied up in a neat little bow, in the shortest time possible.

There was no way, when he was getting ready for bed last night, that he could have ever expected that he was only a handful of hours away from powering through his Goro Akechi-related wish list so fast that he's adding (and crossing off) new items as he goes.

Ren wished that restoring reality hadn't also meant that Goro had to sacrifice himself?

Cross it off.

Ren wished that he could have personally had a hand in saving Goro?

Cross that (kind of selfish) one off too.

Ren wished that he had stopped holding himself back, ignored all the potential consequences, and just kissed Goro?

Cross it off! And then scribble down and cross off all the other stuff they did too, because between handjobs, blowjobs, and the fact that he's currently having to deal with how awkward it is to try and have a conversation with his friends when he feels like he and Goro both have stamps that say 'We just boned!' on their foreheads, it's probably pretty safe to say that they've done a lot more than kiss.

Speaking of his friends...

Ren had, of course, also wished that he could spend his last day in Tokyo with all of the Phantom Thieves.

And here they all are.

Well.

Almost.

They're missing Sumire. Which sucks. Even though she would probably object (very politely) to being called a Phantom Thief, it doesn't change the fact that she's definitely earned her place among them. But hey, nine out of ten Thieves is miles better than only eight, especially when they'd all thought that number nine was dead.

So Ren got to watch his friends hash it out with Goro, and things had been tense, but they also went surprisingly well. And while he knew that he could count on them (because when have they ever let him down?), he'd still been stupid nervous anyway.

But things worked out! Somehow! And Ren is over the freakin' moon!

To top it all off, things aren't even that awkward anymore, despite everything that's happened between Goro and the rest of his friends. Everyone is actually kind of gelling, and maybe even starting to have fun together.

Which, he's sure that watching Goro decide, out of sheer (and predictable) stubbornness, to torture himself with a plate of curry, probably went a long way to smoothing things over.

(There's nothing quite like a little low stakes schadenfreude to bring a group together.)

But then Ren's next roll of the dice comes up snake eyes, and he has to accept that his luck has finally run out.

Because he feels like someone kicked the stool right out from under him.

"I'm going to turn myself in, of course." Goro sounds steady and calm, casual as anything. As if he hadn't just hit Ren with the verbal equivalent of a kick in the teeth.

Goro is so collected, in fact, that Ren has to assume that he's already put at least some thought into this… plan. Although when exactly he found the time to do that is beyond him. Had Goro stayed up all night thinking about it? Had he been weighing up the pros and cons of giving himself up to the police while they'd been making out and fooling around?

Why hadn't Ren noticed anything?

He feels like there's not enough air in his lungs.

Ren opens his mouth, closes it again, and then bites down on his lip to stop himself from continuing on like he's a fish gasping for air. Ending up just staring down at where his hands are clenched on his thighs, while he struggles to come up with something that might help, anything at all...

People are always telling him that he's good at giving advice, aren't they? This shouldn't be any different, or any more difficult, right?

But no matter how hard he tries, there's just nothing there.

He can't think of anything.

And even if he could, what if there's no magic combination of words that will suddenly make all of this go away?

Maybe if he hadn't been so caught up in the moment, or in ignoring the fact that he was going home tomorrow, he'd have stopped to think about what coming back from the dead actually meant for Goro.

It's this awful parallel to what happened in Shido's Palace, having all of his friends at his back as he scrambles to try and figure out how to talk Goro down.

And just like in that engine room, he feels like anything he says will be ultimately futile. Goro's going to do what he thinks is right, regardless.

Ren can feel the others looking to him — can feel Goro's expectant eyes on him too — everyone is waiting for his reaction, and he's just sitting here, floundering.

"I can contact my sister for you, if you'd like," Makoto offers, taking the lead, and giving Ren some much-needed time to play 52 pickup with his scattered thoughts.

"I was intending to reach out to Sae-san myself, actually," Goro replies, almost dismissive, his eyes only flicking in her direction for a second before he goes back to using them to try to drill a hole into Ren's skull. It's just one more thing that's making it hard to think clearly. "She's the only contact I have from my time working with the prosecutor's office that I'm positive has no connection to Shido's conspiracy."

"Sis doesn't work for the prosecutor's office anymore," Makoto says stiffly, and Ren doesn't have to look to know how hard she's trying to hide the fact that Goro is pressing all of her buttons without even trying to. He clearly wasn't aware of Sae's impending career change, though, because that gets Goro's attention enough for him to actually turn to face her properly. "She's currently in the process of setting up her own legal firm, in fact. She wants to become a defence attorney. I'm sure that she'd be happy to help you."

Before Goro can respond, Haru speaks up. "I'm sorry, but what is the point of this?" She sounds just as softly polite as usual, on the surface. Ren can hear the steel underneath.

"Excuse me?" Goro almost gasps, sounding flabbergasted, and maybe even a little affronted. Like if he was wearing pearls, he'd be clutching them. It might even be funny under other circumstances.

Okay.

Maybe it's still a little funny.

"Please forgive me for interrupting, Mako-chan, Akechi-kun," she continues, looking Goro dead in the eye, and not really sounding apologetic at all, "but I don't understand. Do you honestly think that wasting your life in a prison cell is the right way to atone? Because I don't, and I don't think that you really do either, Akechi-kun. Not when you could use this opportunity to actually do something to make up for your mistakes, rather than hide away from them."

Every head in the room has turned to stare at Haru, but Goro is literally gaping at her, struck completely speechless.

Ren could kiss her.

Not only is she doing a much better job of tackling the issue at hand (that is — pointing out how dumb Goro is being, for someone who is usually so smart) than he is, she's also taken the immediate focus off of him.

Without the combined force of every eyeball in the room on him, Ren feels like he can actually take a second to breathe, and as he turns what Makoto was saying over in his head, something clicks. The mention of Sae Niijima is like a much-needed drop of oil on the rusty gears in his brain, and all of a sudden, he has the beginnings of an idea.

There's a pinprick of light at the end of the tunnel now, and Ren feels the ghost of a smirk pull at his lips, along with a familiar and satisfying little rush starting to fizz in his veins. The kind of feeling he usually gets when a pick turns just right, and the last tumbler in a particularly difficult lock slides into place.

Because he's just realised that he doesn't actually need to talk Goro out of doing anything. Not if he comes at this from a different angle.

"I'm not in prison."

Goro's mouth snaps shut around whatever it was that he was going to say to Haru (which, let's be real, is probably for the best), and he whirls back around, hair flying about his face in a pretty cloud. "What?"

Ren has to try very hard not to laugh at the way his face is all scrunched up in bad-tempered confusion. "I already did the whole 'turning myself in' thing, remember? I admitted to being the leader of the Phantom Thieves — literally number one at the top of Japan's most wanted list, and I mean, okay, yeah, they did stick me in juvenile detention, but that was only because I violated my probation. And here I am…" Ren pauses to gesture at his surroundings, and then himself, just to really drive the point home. "Not in prison. Have you stopped to think about why?"

"That's—" Goro starts, still indignant, but then the penny drops, and he grimaces, like he just bit into something extremely sour. Or spicy. "They couldn't charge you with any crimes related to the Metaverse, clearly."

It's ridiculous, and it's another thing that's also kind of funny, but Ren can't tell if Goro looks so annoyed because he doesn't like the fact that he had to have the suddenly obvious flaw in his plan pointed out to him, or if he's actually just that disappointed at the idea of not being able to get himself put away for life.

Ren can't help himself. He has to poke and prod a little more. "You told me, in January, that they released you before they tried to actually press any charges—" He does try not to sound too smug about the whole thing, but the way that Goro rolls his eyes while he's speaking means that he probably doesn't quite manage it. "But the cops must have still made it pretty obvious that they didn't believe anything you told them, right?"

"No, they didn't," Goro sighs, "but that whole thing was a farce. The 'interrogation' they subjected me to consisted almost entirely of me talking, while two empty-headed detectives did little more than smile and nod — honestly, it was more like a glorified counselling session than any real attempt at questioning a suspect—" He interrupts himself with a chuckle. It's a wry and bitter thing. Ren thinks that, given the circumstances, he probably shouldn't find it as hot as he does. "Which, it's almost too on the nose, isn't it? I'm sure that Maruki really enjoyed himself, watching and squirrelling away all the little details, like the greedy fucking voyeur that he is. So, no, Ren — I suppose that my previous experience with surrendering myself to the authorities can't really be used as any kind of benchmark for what could happen if I were to do it now."

Goro picks up his cup of coffee in his usual dainty way and takes a prim little sip. Ren uses the momentary lull in the conversion to let everything sink in properly.

It would make sense, kind of, for Maruki to use Goro's 'arrest' as an opportunity to have something like a one-on-one session with him. He'd had ones with all the rest of them at some point, after all, and having Goro literally locked up was probably the closest he could get…

But, hang on a second… hadn't Maruki implied (or maybe he'd outright stated?) that he was straight up able to view their memories? Back when he was explaining why he thought that Goro was dead? Why would he need to get the 'details' from Goro through other methods?

Ren shakes his head. That's something that he can worry about later. He has more important things to focus on right now.

"Okay, so," Ren starts, scrubbing one hand absent-mindedly through his hair, and wincing when his fingers get caught in a stubborn knot, "getting charged with, uh... supernatural assassination is off the table, pretty much."

"That certainly seems like a step in the right direction," Yusuke adds helpfully.

Goro just huffs into his cup.

There's more to it though, Ren thinks, as he remembers having a very real-looking gun pointed at him in Mementos, back when Goro challenged him to a duel in November. Then, obviously, there's also the fact that Goro had volunteered to be the one to take care of things in the interrogation room — which, as far as Goro had been concerned, was not something that was going to be happening in the Metaverse.

Futaba, at least, seems to be on the same wavelength as him, because she speaks up and saves him from having to come up with a delicate way to phrase his next question. "So, um… that's great and all, but," she says, hugging her knees tightly to her chest, and peering at Goro from the safety of the small letterbox of space between her kneecaps and the line of her bangs, "is there a-anything that you'd be confessing to that they, um, could prosecute you for?"

Ren doesn't know how, or when, their roles got so reversed that she's stepping in to help him when he's struggling to put his thoughts into words. He can't say that he isn't proud of her, though, or that he doesn't appreciate it — because he does, immensely.

He needs to make some time for her later, to let her know that he owes her. Big time.

"Oh!" Goro coughs a surprised and sardonic sounding laugh into the back of his hand. "You're asking me if I did any of my father's dirty work outside of the Metaverse."

"Well, did you?" Yusuke chimes in again, blunt as ever. Ren has a gut feeling that he's trying to redirect Goro's attention away from Futaba this time, rather than out of any real interest in what he has to say.

"What, Kitagawa? Did I go around 'disposing' of people for him? In reality?" There's a current of condescension under Goro's words, and Ren wonders if it's as obvious to everyone else that he's only spoiling for a fight because his ego is bruised.

Yusuke nods, expression passive, not rising to the bait at all, and Goro's upper lip twitches in obvious irritation before he continues on with the rest of his explanation. "No, I didn't — and really, that would be obvious to all of you if you stopped to think about it for more than two seconds. You were in Shido's Palace, after all, so you should know exactly what kind of people he kept on his payroll—"

"The Cleaner," Ren sighs, relieved, and immediately feels bad for worrying about it in the first place.

"Yes, the Cleaner." Goro shoots him a slightly exasperated look, and Ren just offers his most apologetic shrug in return. "Shido had his fingers in all kinds of nasty yakuza pies, and he generally preferred to rely on them when someone was in the way, so to speak. He had no reason not to, when he also had enough of the police force in his pocket that he didn't really need to worry about any evidence that might be left behind. Which suited me fine, honestly, I don't think I'd have been able to keep up with the demand if he'd only been relying on me."

This whole time, Sojiro has still been puttering around behind the bar, having returned to his usual role of the silent observer once their conversation turned to the Metaverse, and he was aimlessly wiping down the bar when Shido's yakuza connections were brought up. Even though Ren was mostly focused on what Goro was saying, he'd still noticed Sojiro's movements go all stiff and jerky for a second before he gave up the pretence of 'cleaning' entirely. By the time that Goro's finished the rest of what he has to say, Sojiro has already shrugged off his apron and is heading for the door.

"I'm going out," he grumbles, pulling his hat onto his head with a little more force than usual, "I need to go and pick up some things at the store, and I could use the fresh air... before you kids give me a goddamn heart attack."

There's a chorus of chastened, and slightly awkward, 'sorry, Boss's that he waves off as he steps outside. Ren watches, through the glass of the door, as Sojiro stops on the other side and seems to deliberate with himself for a second, before he takes the time to flip the sign around to 'closed', so they won't be disturbed, and heads off down the street.

It's the kind of small, considerate gesture that Ren's own parents would never even think to do, and his heart swells with fondness for Sojiro at the same time that it aches. It's only going to be a year, he knows that, but it still feels wrong, and unfair, to have to just go back to Kanbara and leave everything, and everyone, important to him behind.

"So…" Morgana starts, pulling Ren out of his thoughts, and breaking the start of another awkward silence before it can properly settle in. "If there's no proof... then what? Shido doesn't have anything on you?"

"I didn't say that," Goro replies, and enough of the fight has drained out of him now that he only really sounds tired. "Someone like Shido couldn't get as far as he did without being shrewd about the people he let get close to him. In the beginning, when I first approached him, he had me running all sorts of little errands around Tokyo. Collecting information, delivering bribes, etcetera — stupid shit that he could have had literally anyone else do. I would be very surprised if it wasn't for the express purpose of having something incriminating to hold over me, in the event that I ever tried to, ah, get out…"

Mouth twisting into a deep frown as he trails off, his eyes go a little unfocused and distant. It reminds Ren of the expression that had been on his face (only when he thought Ren wasn't paying attention, of course) the last time they went to play billiards together in November. Back when Goro was dropping so many hints about what was going to happen that Ren had half-convinced himself that he wasn't going to go through with it.

It's the look of someone who has been treading water for so long that just letting go, and slipping beneath the surface, is starting to seem like the best option.

Ren reaches out to thread their fingers together. "Hey," he says gently, squeezing Goro's hand in a way that he hopes is reassuring, "that all sounds like stuff that Makoto's sister can help you with—"

"You're even more naïve than I thought you all were if you think that this is something that can be resolved by Sae-san making a couple of phone calls," Goro cuts across him, tone suddenly harsh and acerbic. He's switched gears so abruptly that Ren thinks he's going to rebuff his affectionate gesture and pull his hand away, but Goro surprises him by returning the squeeze instead. Although it does kind of feel more like he's trying to grind Ren's finger bones into dust when he does it, rather than something sweet or caring. Ouch. "The thing that none of you seem to understand, is that I have no idea what's waiting for me out there — no idea how deep my father's conspiracy really ran, or who might still be trying to 'clean-up' whatever's left of it. And even if I wanted to, it's not as if I could realistically go into hiding either, because I can't remember the last time — outside of Maruki's fucking delusion — that I walked down the street without somebody recognising me! If someone is going to come for me, I'd prefer to face them head-on, rather than just waiting around for the other shoe to drop!"

Yusuke makes a thoughtful sound under his breath. "I fail to see how having yourself arrested, and potentially incarcerated, would help you achieve that…"

Ren blinks a couple of times, because he really had almost missed that, until Yusuke said it.

Something doesn't add up here.

And that something is in what Goro isn't saying.

Because why is he so dead set on getting himself put away, anyway? He knows that Goro doesn't really have any great love or respect for the criminal justice system, so it doesn't make any sense for him to think that he'd need to turn himself in to make amends. Then there's the fact that, with the way he's talking, it sounds like doing so would be as good as putting a target on his back.

Wait.

Unless that's what he wants…?

Oh.

That's exactly what he wants.

Ren actually laughs, an incredulous breath of a chuckle. "I can't believe you're trying to do this again, Goro."

He knows that he's right on the money when that's the thing that makes Goro pull his hand away, so that he can wrap his arms around himself defensively. The corners of his mouth even twitch upwards for a second, as if he has to consciously stop himself from hiding behind a polite smile, before he scowls and looks away. Ren's not sure why he bothered, though, when the words that come out of his mouth next ring just as true as the smile would have.

"I'm not sure that I know what you're talking about, Ren."

"You were going to try and flush them out," Ren says, slow and calm, like he's negotiating with a gloomy or irritable shadow. "You think that there's someone out there tying up the loose ends — loose ends like all of us — and you want to use yourself as bait to force them to make a move."

Maybe Ren should be angry, or frustrated, but all he really feels is a weird mixture of relief and determination. Relief, that he cottoned onto what Goro was trying to do, and determination, because it's not happening.

He only just got Goro back, and he's not going to stand by and watch him close the bulkhead door again.

"Okumura said it already, didn't she?" Goro still isn't looking at him, but he does lift his head up enough to send a sideways glance in the general direction of the booth. "That I should use this opportunity to make up for my mistakes?"

Ren's heart lurches painfully in his chest.

"Akechi…" Morgana says softly.

Haru makes a wounded squeaking noise. "You know that's not what I meant, Akechi-kun!"

"That's messed up, dude," Ryuji adds.

"Thank you for your input, Sakamoto," Goro sneers, but it's half-hearted at best. "It's a moot point anyway. It's already been established that I probably won't even see a courtroom, let alone a jail cell. Really, though, it's only delaying the inevitable — it won't be long before some unhinged fan catches sight of me and posts my face all over the internet."

Ren almost feels a lightbulb manifest above his head, and the little 'ding!' sound to go along with it, because while there isn't much he can do about some shady guys that might be lurking in the shadows, there is one part of Goro's problem that he can address. "Futaba?"

Jumping at the sound of her name, she sits up straighter in her seat, hands immediately moving to hover over her keyboard. Ready and waiting to receive orders. "What's up?"

"What's this about?" Goro asks at almost the same time, instantly suspicious.

Ren takes a deep breath before he starts to explain. "After what happened in Shido's Palace, and again, after I got back in February… I asked Futaba to keep an eye out, y'know? For anything to do with you. Online. Just, uh, just in case..."

Goro makes a face, and Ren can see the way the muscles flex in his arms as he hugs himself a little tighter, clearly uncomfortable. Ren isn't entirely sure why the fact that he cared enough to look for him should bother Goro so much, but he has a couple of ideas. None of them are good.

Self-worth and Goro's obvious lack of it are not subjects that Ren feels confident tackling, even though he knows that it is probably going to come up between them at some point. One thing that he knows for sure, though, is that it's definitely not something he can bring up here, in front of all of his friends.

So he leaves it for now, and turns back to the booth, making eye contact with Futaba and trying to ignore the bewildered and concerned expressions on everyone else's faces. It's the first time they're all hearing about this, after all, so it's not surprising that they all look a little thrown, but while he does feel bad for keeping them in the dark, he doesn't really regret it either. Futaba's well-meaning, but painfully awkward, attempts to be sympathetic when he'd first asked for her help were bad enough. There was no reason for all the rest of them to have to suffer through the same thing as well.

Or at least, that's how he's choosing to justify it to himself, anyway.

But the way they're all looking at him now, and Morgana's slightly hurt expression, in particular, makes him think that the excuse probably wouldn't fly if he voiced it.

So, he doesn't — just waits for Futaba to do her thing.

"So, um, yeah… gimme a sec... let me just pull it all back up..." Pushing her glasses up her nose with one hand, she taps away furiously on her keyboard with the other. "There!"

Goro is up and off his stool, pretty much the second that Futaba turns the laptop for everyone to see, and Ren follows him to the booth; it's the only way that either of them would have any real hope of being able to actually see what Futaba is showing them, when everyone else has leaned forward to look too. It takes some jostling (and more than a little complaining), but eventually, everyone settles into a position where they all have a decent view of the laptop, without anyone's head being too in the way.

There's usually a kind of organised chaos to Futaba's desktop, but right now there are so many windows open on the screen that they're overlapping each other haphazardly, and that makes it hard to find one point to focus on. There's a lot of text that Ren can't easily read from this far away, but that isn't a big deal, really, because he's seen all of this before. Even if he hadn't, though, it would still be pretty obvious what he's looking at even without the text, because the screen is plastered with pictures of Goro. They vary wildly in quality, ranging from glossy glamour shots to cutesy selfies in cafés. Then there are the fan photos — some of which are more selfies, just of the group variety (Goro surrounded by gangs of star-struck schoolgirls, charming smile firmly in place, bright and false, and nearly identical in every picture), but others are more candid, taken by cagier fans from afar, without Goro knowing.

They were the ones that had held Ren's attention the most when Futaba had shown all of this to him that first time, in December.

Here's Goro standing in line at Yon Germain, looking tired and harried, and frowning down at something on his phone. Then there are a series of pictures of him at Inokashira Park, obviously taken in quick succession (and very sneakily), that show him stopping at a bench to stretch and take a break during his morning cycle… Ren is not ashamed to admit that it's a picture set that he would revisit in his mind, many, many times when he was alone. Who could blame him, though? Because, well, bike shorts!

Then there's the photo where he's standing just inside the doorway of Penguin Sniper, taking refuge from a sudden downpour. Goro is frozen in time, smiling warmly, with one hand half-raised to greet a person who was caught just as they walked into frame — their only distinguishable features being the blur of a familiar dark umbrella and a denim-clad leg. Ren thinks it might have been one of the first times they'd gone to the lounge together, when all he'd really known about Goro was that, on top of the whole 'hates the Phantom Thieves' thing (and the 'being able to understand Morgana' thing), he was very interesting, and very pretty.

Ren lets his eyes slide away from the screen and to the real Goro beside him. He's squinting down at the laptop, distaste clear in the set of his jaw, but Ren sees something flicker behind his eyes, and he wonders if he's figured it out. "Those are my—"

"Your social media, your blog—" Futaba ticks them off on her fingers as she goes. She sounds much more confident now than she did earlier, which is what usually happens when she's talking about tech stuff. "And your top five most popular fansites."

"Let me guess…" Goro's tone makes it very clear that what he's about to say is anything but. "Towards the end of December, right around Christmas Eve, all the activity dries up, and now there's nothing on them at all — no posts from concerned fans, or well-wishers."

"Uh, yeah... that's right…" Futaba sounds a little crestfallen at having the wind taken out of her sails, but she's quick to recover. "I also reached out to a bunch of my old party members — from back in my Medjed days — and they couldn't find anything. There's nothing on the dark web either. It's like the new year started and everyone got, uh, memory-wiped... or at least all of their Akechi-flags got removed, anyways."

"Is that down to what happened with Yaldabaoth?" Makoto asks.

"Perhaps…" Akechi muses, one hand on his chin. "That is what I had assumed originally as well, when I turned on my phone and the only meaningful correspondence on it — from the end of December onwards — was from your sister, and the people in this room. Yaldabaoth is the obvious choice, at first..."

Makoto crosses her arms and leans back in the booth seat, a similarly pensive expression on her face. "But you think it might be something else?"

"It's just a hypothesis… but what if it has something to do with Maruki's reality-warping abilities? He removed my celebrity status in January — either in an attempt to try to make his version of the world more attractive to me… or perhaps it was just a side effect of altering things so that I had never approached Shido? Regardless of his reasons, whatever he did, it made me very much anonymous."

"But we beat the doc, right?" Ryuji asks, "everythin' went back to normal..."

"Something has to be causing it, though," Futaba says, "and if it wasn't Maruki, then it was Yaldy — and I know that wisdom is your dump stat, Ryuji, but in case you forgot, we kinda beat him too!"

"Hey, I was just askin'!" Ryuji cries, just as Futaba takes aim and flicks one of those little paper sachets of salt at him. He ducks out of the way easily, and it sails harmlessly over his head and into the empty booth behind them.

Ren hurries to take control of the conversation again, before Ryuji gets it in his head to retaliate. He'd usually be more than on board for an impromptu condiment fight, but there are still way too many unanswered questions for them to start getting distracted now. "There's a difference, though, Goro — between making you not-famous, and making it like you never existed."

"I'm not saying that it was what Maruki intended, necessarily," Goro shrugs, "I just think that it's entirely possible that what he did might have had a lasting effect on the public cognition. Really, the bigger question is what it actually means for me now — how far does it go? Do I even have a life to return to?"

"You were still on your school's records last time I checked," Futaba says, all business again, as she spins her laptop back around to do some more frenetic typing. "Yup, still there… and, yeah, the last manual notes on your file are from the twentieth of December — it's just automated truancy logging after that, and wow, you've really racked up an impressive combo… which — coming from me? That's saying something..." Pausing, she leans in even closer to squint at the screen. "Um, it also, kinda, maybe, looks like you just missed your graduation…"

Ann rests her chin on the heel of one hand and looks up at Goro. "Does that mean you need to repeat third year?"

"You did take a couple of college entrance exams at the same time that I did, so… maybe not?" Makoto adds and then smiles like she usually does when she's going to try to join in with Futaba and Ryuji when they're ribbing each other. Ren braces himself. This does not usually go well. "Assuming, of course, that you passed, Akechi-kun?"

Still deep in thought, Goro has been standing with one hand gripping the back of the booth seat behind Yusuke's head, while he worries at his lower lip with the other. He's so distracted that he hardly reacts to what Makoto said at all, just making a tutting sound through his teeth before offhandedly muttering, "I never placed lower than the top five. Naturally."

Ren catches her eye and offers her a sympathetic half-smile, half-wince, and she accepts it with her own tight-lipped smile.

"Naturally, of course…" she sighs and shifts focus to whatever she has as the next point on her internal checklist. "What are you going to do now then?"

"I do still want to speak with Sae-san, but I would prefer to wait until tomorrow, at least… until after…" he trails off and looks in Ren's direction.

The rest of what he wants to say is pretty obvious, but that won't stop Ren from spelling it out. "You want to wait until after I've left."

"Aww, that's sweet!" Ann coos at the same time that Futaba makes a gagging noise.

"Yes, fine, it's true," Goro admits begrudgingly, and shifts his weight onto one foot so that he can kick at Ren's shin lightly with the other. "You don't have to look so smug about it."

"Oh, I really do," Ren grins, and Morgana joins Futaba in sounding like he might be about to hack up a lung.

Goro clears his throat, and then brings a hand up to his mouth, in what Ren is like, ninety percent sure is an effort to hide his own smile. "As for what I'd like to do in the immediate future — I wouldn't be averse to picking up a change of clothes. I don't know how feasible that is, however, given my current situation."

"You're still on your apartment's lease, if that's what you're wondering," Futaba says, having apparently overcome her debilitating illness, "and I've patched into the building's CCTV a couple of times already, I don't think that anyone's been watching the place… Not since the first couple of weeks after you dropped off the grid, anyways."

Ren wishes that he was close enough to pat her on the head. "So you're saying that we should be safe to go to Goro's place?"

"I mean, yeah, probably?" She shrugs and then breaks out into a sharp grin. "I can even set up a loop of old security footage, if you want. That way, there'll be no record of him going back."

"Wow, Futaba!" Ann goggles. "That's like something out of a movie!"

"Heh, I wouldn't be much of a navi if I couldn't do this much!"

"Sakura, as much as I appreciate this…" Goro interrupts, "you are aware of the potentially life-ruining consequences of playing so fast and loose with this country's privacy laws?"

"Don't bother," Makoto says, in the long-suffering tone of Mom Friends everywhere, "she doesn't listen."

"Do you narcs want the assist or not?" Futaba huffs, without looking back up from her screen.

"You're gonna need help, right?" Ryuji asks, before Goro or Makoto can respond. "To get your stuff?"

Goro clears his throat awkwardly. "I don't expect any of you to put yourselves out on my behalf. Sakura is already doing more than enough…"

Ryuji makes a dismissive noise. "Nah, man, me n' Yusuke'd be happy to give you a hand."

Yusuke baulks at the suggestion. "We would?"

Ren hums under his breath. "Hmm, you know, it's not like I need to save up for weapons and equipment anymore… so I'll buy dinner for the moving crew — whoever they might be," he offers, and laughs when Yusuke's eyes widen comically.

"Ah yes, I suppose that offering Akechi assistance in his time of need is the least that we could do."

"I wanna come too!" Ann says, clapping her hands. "Sneaking in and stuff sounds like fun! Kind of like we're infiltrating a Palace?"

"It is a little bit like that, isn't it?" Haru says, sounding cautiously excited. "And I can ask my driver to help you transport your things, Akechi-kun."

"I've already bought some flatpack boxes in anticipation of my own move…" Makoto adds. "I suppose that we could use those."

Goro looks perplexed, flustered, and completely and utterly lost. "Why are you all so willing to help me?"

"Once a Phantom Thief, always a Phantom Thief, Akechi," Morgana says, jumping down onto the table in front of them. "And we always look out for each other."

If anything, Goro just seems even more confused.

Ren reaches out to take his hand again, and tugs at it until Goro gets the message and turns to face him.

"You ready for one last heist, Goro?"

Chapter Text

L'enfer, c'est les autres.

Hell is other people.

Back when Goro was still giving interviews, and therefore still playing the role of the charming and ever so precocious Detective Prince, he would often be asked about his interest in philosophy. Only ever in passing, of course, and with the expectation that he would answer in the kind of simple, and still perfectly digestible, sound bites that added just the right amount of authenticity to his intellectual image, without ever going into enough detail to make him seem too aloof, or unapproachable, to his vapid fanbase.

And even though that love for philosophy was just as much a construct as the rest of his public persona, he'd still put a not-insubstantial amount of time and effort into doing the required reading, because Goro Akechi does not do things by halves. The desire to be good (the best) at something, and doing it well (perfectly), are just not things he's ever been able to compromise on. He's still not entirely sure how he'd managed it, really, but by some means, he'd crammed the consumption of a mountain of musty texts into his, already very busy, schedule. Which was how he'd found out, to his surprise, that there were actually one or two works that resonated with him.

No Exit (or Huis Clos, in the original French) by Jean-Paul Sartre had become a particular favourite of his, in a masochistic sort of way, with its exploration of the concept of how painfully unpleasant it is to be truly perceived by others, and judged accordingly.

It's what comes to mind, more and more, when he thinks about the Phantom Thieves.

That isn't to say that he seriously believes that his interactions with them are some kind of divine punishment or torture specifically designed to be retribution for his crimes.

No.

That would be ludicrous.

Even if it might feel that way a lot of the time.

From the mortification of spilling his guts to them in his father's Palace, to the fact that he'd needed Ren to point out to him exactly why his most recent plan was just as much of a non-starter as the previous one had been…

Again, while they'd all been watching.

And that's not all! No! There's also the slightly more mundane (but still unbearable) embarrassment of today's lunchtime curry fiasco, and of course, it's not as if he could ever forget the stupid fucking takoyaki that came before it.

Now they're on the train, on their way to his apartment, and he is trying desperately to remember what kind of condition he'd left it in, back on that fateful day in December. The one that would eventually culminate in the confrontation in the engine room.

His living space has always been... messy; he's under no illusions about that. Having it be presentable had seemed like a relatively low priority, all things considered, when he'd never planned to 'entertain' anyone there, let alone seven other teenagers and their not-cat. There's no escaping the fact that there will most likely be schoolwork, books, and files strewn about the place, but he is almost positive that he had taken the trash out (or the majority of it at least) relatively recently. Coming across as untidy and disorganised isn't exactly desirable, but it's still leagues better than seeming dirty, isn't it? And who knows? Maybe he'll finally catch a break, and Shido's goons will have set themselves up nicely to take the blame for his slovenliness by ransacking the place.

And if not, then what's one more embarrassment to add to the ever-growing list, really?

Because the Phantom Thieves always seem to end up having front row seats to his discomfort and humiliation, regardless of his own feelings on the matter.

As if on cue, the crush of people in the train car shifts to make room for a fresh wave of passengers to get on. An elbow digs into Goro's back, and he has to tighten his grip on the metal support bar above him just to stay vertical. Somehow, despite the fact that there could not possibly be room for any more people, there's still jostling and pushing going on behind him, and he has to brace his other hand against the wall of the car to stop himself from being shoved forward and directly on top of Sakura. The girl in question doesn't seem to notice how close he came to flattening her, just staying hunched over her phone, in the one solitary seat that they managed to secure when they first got on the train.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Try to ignore the suffocating, sticky, animal heat that comes with being crammed into a ridiculously small, metal box with far too many other humans. Many of whom smell like they were never made aware of a lovely little modern invention called deodorant.

Say what you will about the unsettling subway cars in Mementos, but at least the shadows on them didn't fucking stink.

The worst part (on a long list of various other shitty parts), is that he's sure that he probably doesn't smell much better than the unwashed masses around him. It's a direct consequence of having not showered for at least a day and a half (assuming that the months he spent in Velvet Limbo don't count), and from engaging in a lot of delightfully messy and strenuous physical activity this morning. Certainly, it's so warm and stuffy in here, he feels like he must be sweating right through his borrowed button-up, and into the ratty old hoodie that he'd been cajoled into wearing as they were leaving Leblanc.

It had made a sort of sense when Ren had shoved the shabby thing into his arms earlier — that wearing it with the hood up might serve as a last line of defence, flimsy as it may be. Just in case Sakura was mistaken (she had not taken the suggestion that her data was anything other than perfect well. Goro could relate), and someone actually does end up recognising him.

He's thoroughly regretting going along with it now, though, of course. The hood is only adding to his feeling of sweaty claustrophobia.

"You okay, dude?" Sakamoto whisper-shouts right beside his ear, and Goro catches himself before he snarls something unpleasant back, because he shouldn't even be angry at him for being so close. It's not as if it's his fault that they're being literally jammed up against each other by the throng of people around them.

"I'm fine," he grits out, and wonders if the sharp thing that's currently trying to burrow through his ribcage and puncture his left lung is the pointy end of some asshole's umbrella, or if it's actually just Kitagawa's freakishly bony elbow.

"You sure?" Ren's voice comes from somewhere to his right... Or maybe it was more from behind him? It's hard to pin down, and when he tries to turn to look, all he gets is an eyeful of Sakamoto's bright pineapple head.

Great.

Whatever.

He might not be able to see Ren, but he heard him well enough to know that he's finding this whole thing far more amusing than any sane person should.

Denying him the satisfaction of a response, Goro ignores him entirely.

Though, trying to figure out Ren's exact location leaves him wondering where the others have ended up. He has eyes on Sakura, and of course, he's currently the unwilling meat in a Sakamoto-Kitagawa sandwich... which, honestly, the less he thinks about that the better. Morgana, the lucky little shit, is presumably still safely tucked into Ren's bag, but Goro is realising that he's long lost track of where Niijima, Takamaki, and Okumura are in this veritable sea of bodies.

He hopes that they haven't been crushed to death. It would be unfortunate. Particularly when he's only just begun to see the merit in getting along with them.

"Are we nearly there?" Sakura squeaks up at him. Her eyes are big, round, and over-bright behind her glasses, and her mouth is pinched in at the corners. She does not look well at all, and he's not sure if it's the light from something she has open on her phone, or if she's genuinely gone that green around the gills.

God, he hopes that she isn't going to vomit.

"It's the next stop," he answers, and is trying to come up with some kind of reassuring platitude, when the hard edge of someone's shoe scrapes down the back of his ankle, definitely taking a layer of skin with it, and nearly popping his heel right out of his own shoe. Closing his eyes, he bites the inside of his cheek to distract himself from the urge to kick out blindly behind him, like a mindless fucking donkey, in retaliation.

How the hell did he get himself into this god awful situation?

A figurative question, obviously.

And a fairly pointless one at that.

Because in the literal sense, there is an increasingly improbable and convoluted sequence of events that led to Goro having the life squeezed out of him in this glorified can of sardines. You could go back a year, maybe two, or even just back to that day in the TV studio when he'd decided to approach the group of Shujin students that he overheard talking about the Phantom Thieves. But this had really started with him choosing to give up his life and his revenge, just moments before he was murdered by the metaphysical manifestation of his father's low opinion of him, and then it ended with him being gently bullied into letting this group of too nice, and too fucking persistent, teenagers help him go to retrieve his things.

And all of that was without going into their little detour to a delusional school counsellor's idea of paradise, or being left in some kind of strange supernatural torpor for months on end, while he was missing and presumed dead by the handful of people who gave a shit… and forgotten entirely by everyone else.

The speaker above him comes to life after what has to have been a small eternity, and a polite, robotic voice announces that they've reached his stop.

If he muscles his way out of the godforsaken, mobile coffin with more force than someone who is supposed to be being discreet about their return to the land of the living probably should, nobody draws attention to it.

"Everyone still in one piece?" Ren asks breezily once they're all on the platform, annoyingly unruffled by the experience.

Goro is wondering how well a joke about pushing him onto the track would be received (his harmless quip about shooting Maruki instead of fighting him, had gone down like a lead balloon, after all), when the small smile slips off Ren's face, and he suddenly looks far more serious.

"Futaba, are you okay?"

Okumura already has one arm around her narrow shoulders, and while Sakura does still look shaken, she actually seems a great deal better now than she had on the train. Goro supposes that there's no way that Ren could know that, though, given that there had been a veritable wall of foul-smelling meat between him and the girl in question for the majority of their train ride.

Sakura gives them all a slightly shaky thumbs up. "I'm good. Really. My batteries are just super drained, and the train is still kinda high level for me… Anyone got something with caffeine in it?"

Nobody does. Of course.

Niijima turns to him. "There must be a convenience store around here, Akechi-kun?"

"Ah, yes," Goro replies dumbly, nearly slapping himself for not thinking to volunteer the information unprompted, "there's one just outside the exit."

Takamaki comes up on Sakura's other side, links their arms together, and almost drags the other girls with her as she starts walking. "We should totally get some snacks!"

And that's how he finds himself being corralled again, as if he were some dopey bovine being led to slaughter, up the stairs and out of the train station, and then into said convenience store.

They're only in the door a hot second when Sakamoto literally grabs Ren, and pulls him into a headlock. Well, maybe not literally, but he does wrap an arm around Ren's shoulders, and steers him forcefully away from the rest of the group. Ren, for his part, shoots him an apologetic look over his shoulder as he's dragged off.

Goro gives him the finger.

Ren just laughs, and turns back to Sakamoto. Goro does catch a brief glimpse of Morgana's face, just before he ducks back into Ren's bag again, and the cat-thing looks very unimpressed with him. Good.

Sakura trails after the two boys, like a little orange duckling, towards the fridges at the back of the store. Presumably to buy some of those obnoxiously coloured (and questionably safe) energy drinks.

Okumura and Niijima wander off in the other direction together, making a beeline for the small case of cakes near the counter, shopping baskets in hand.

Which leaves him with Kitagawa and Takamaki.

Fantastic.

"Okay!" Takamaki claps her hands together, picks up a basket, and takes a determined step forward, like she's about to head into battle. "Where are the sweets?"

"Ah! That sign there," Kitagawa says, pointing at the hanging sign over an aisle to their right as he picks up his own basket (how much food, exactly, are they planning to buy?), "it says 'confectionary'."

Perhaps he can take advantage of the distraction and slip away by himself?

And — no such luck, Takamaki has already noticed the fact that he isn't following them. Half turning his way, she looks him up and down, and then smiles brightly. Goro has to believe it's at least partially genuine, because he knows that she's a terrible actress. It still makes him feel somewhat wary, regardless.

"Are you coming?"

"I suppose so…" he sighs, defeated, and moves to join them, only to be stopped dead in his tracks when Kitagawa holds up his hand.

"You're forgetting your basket, Akechi."

What the fuck? Goro feels his eyebrow twitch. Are they trying to clear the place out?

He takes a deep breath and reminds himself that they are, apparently, here to help him.

And surely there's no harm in buying a stupidly large amount of junk food to gorge themselves on? Isn't that something that normal teenagers are supposed to do?

Not that he has any real frame of reference...

So, for what feels like the hundredth time in the last couple of hours, he decides to ignore his suspicious knee-jerk reaction and play along.

The basket's handle is unpleasantly sticky against his bare fingers, and he finds himself wishing for his gloves again. Although if he thought that they'd look ridiculous with Ren's button-up and jeans, then the expensive leather would certainly look far worse paired with this faded, and worn-out hoodie.

"Everyone else got a welcome party when they became a Phantom Thief, you know?" Takamaki says, as they walk towards what is sure to be a contributing factor to her adult-onset diabetes.

"Did they now?" Goro responds, only because she's watching him expectantly, clearly waiting for him to say something, even though what she's driving at is incredibly obvious.

She opens her mouth as if she means to continue, but becomes immediately distracted once they reach their destination, by a very pink, and very large, bag of marshmallows. Considering the back of it for a couple of thoughtful seconds, she shrugs and drops it into her shopping basket.

Is she seriously just going to leave that statement hanging in the air?

"You were saying?" he prompts, and she stares at him for a second before the fact that she had actually been talking seems to click.

"Oh, right! Yeah, I was just thinking that, like, maybe this could be yours? Since you didn't have one before, 'cause y'know…"

"Because I blackmailed my way into your group, yes," he says dismissively as he scans the shelves. A plain, dark chocolate Pit Pat bar catches his eye (if he's going to be eating garbage, then it might as well be garbage that he actually likes), and he tosses it into his own basket. "And I'm sure that at least some of you were aware that I was going to betray you."

"We were suspicious of you, of course…" Kitagawa's deep voice comes from almost directly behind him, and Goro does not jump. That would be ridiculous. "But no, we had no clue about your true motivations at that point in time."

He watches Kitagawa add another item to his basket (everything in there has blue packaging. Goro is unsure if that's a coincidence, a weird artist-thing, or just a weird Kitagawa-thing), and mulls this new scrap of information over. Did Ren truly have no idea about his intentions? Or had he just played it close to his chest, deciding to keep it from his friends until he felt it was necessary?

It makes him realise just how in the dark he still is about how exactly they came to know about his plan, and even the method by which they'd foiled it so completely.

The information that he does have is spotty at best, cobbled together from context, snippets of conversation in January, and one enlightening exchange in Mementos in particular. When Sakamoto's desire to rub his nose in it had resulted in a surprisingly detailed account of how exactly he'd exposed himself as a Persona-user, long before he approached them at the school festival in October. Apparently, he'd unknowingly repeated something Morgana said. About pancakes, of all things...

And yes, a large part of him is obviously grateful for that slip-up. Without it, there's a very real chance that Ren (and he himself) would be in the ground right now.

But he doesn't think it will ever cease to rankle him. How was he ever supposed to have anticipated that there would be a talking fucking cat to overhear in the first place? Let alone the fact that only people who've been to the Metaverse could understand the damned thing?!

Deep breath.

Setting that aside for the moment, the point still stands — he doesn't actually know, not for sure, how they came to learn about the specifics of his plan in November.

Sakura is the obvious answer, of course, despite how cautious he'd always tried to be with his personal electronics. He's had plenty of first-hand experience in the last twenty-four hours alone of just how savvy she can be with bugs and monitoring phones.

And if Sakura had been spying on him, how long had it been going on? How much did she hear? Or see?

Fuck.

Goro can feel himself starting to spiral again, and he does his best to rein it back in, closing his eyes against the sudden urge to sweep everything off the shelf in front of him and grind it to a fine paste under his heel. It's stupid. He's being stupid. It's not something he should even waste his time thinking about. There's no fucking point. It's not as if it can be undone…

Still, it's hard to get it out of his head now that it's in there. He feels exposed and uncomfortable... like there are hundreds of tiny insects crawling all over him. Itchy and unpleasant. Impossible to ignore.

What can he do about it, though? Other than to continue on as he has been?

The only thing, really, is to be hyper-vigilant for any tells or slip-ups… anything that might indicate that they know more than they should.

A blonde head suddenly bobs into his eye-line. "Is that really all you're getting, Akechi?"

"Oh—" Goro blinks a couple of times, and then looks down at his solitary Pit Pat, sitting sadly in the centre of his basket by itself. "No... I was just thinking," he says, grabbing the closest thing to hand and throwing it into his basket without actually looking at it.

He's not entirely sure how long he was caught up in his internal dialogue (getting lost in his own head has always been a problem for him, ever since he was a small child), but Takamaki has amassed quite an impressive haul while he was thinking, so it was probably more than just a minute or two.

Although... Kitagawa is still talking — is making quite the spectacle of himself, in fact, swooning in the aisle, with his basket swinging wildly from the crook of one spindly arm — so maybe less time has passed than Takamaki's junk food collection might lead him to believe.

Goro thinks he might hear him say something about hotpot... and porridge? "What?"

"Don't mind, Yusuke," Takamaki titters, still far too close, and then flaps her free hand obnoxiously in his face. "Can you help me get that pack of strawberry Bocky up there? I can't reach…"

Goro takes a half step back, squints suspiciously up at the row of boxes on the top shelf, and then back to Takamaki. She only flinches slightly.

He's feeling sceptical, to say the least.

Takamaki is not particularly short, and she's also wearing boots that add another couple of inches to her height, so he's sure that she would be able to get what she's after if she were to actually try. But he has an inkling about what it is that she's aiming for, truthfully. That — on top of being lazy — she's trying to extend an olive branch. An ill-thought-out attempt to make him feel needed, or useful, or something else equally inane.

It's definitely somewhere in the region of pity, isn't it? He thinks to himself bitterly as he grabs the flimsy box down from the shelf and pushes it into her waiting hands. Some of the displeasure must be showing on his face, but she just thanks him, assailing him with another bright smile, and if anything, this one looks even more sincere.

Goro finds himself wondering, not for the first time, if all of the Phantom Thieves are somewhat touched in the head.

"You know, you actually kind of remind me of a friend of mine..." she says cryptically, as the box of Bocky joins the mountain of food in her basket.

Thinking about pressing her for more details, several responses run through his mind (on a sliding scale of severity, starting with a polite 'Ah, is that so?' and ending with something more like 'Could you just say what you fucking mean?'), but she turns away from him in a flurry of long pigtails and fruity smelling perfume, before he can even start to get the words out.

At least she's finally given him some much-needed space.

Something about her smile sticks with him, though, while the three of them continue to gather enough candy to give an elephant heart palpitations. He learns that there is actually a kind of logic to the way they all split up, that it's delegation. The three of them are to procure sweets for the entire group, while the others get the savoury snacks, and the drinks, and anything else that they might need. Having things reframed as a task with a goal helps to distract him from his more turbulent thoughts, and he might even find himself with an echo of Takamaki's expression on his own face by the time they're done.

"Akechi?" she asks, just as they're about to head over to the counter, to hopefully meet back up with the others and get this shitshow on the road. "Can I ask you something?"

"What is it?"

"You used to call us all by our given names before… before y'know..." she says, laughing awkwardly. "Why'd you stop?"

Well, this is unexpected.

"Takamaki," he starts, keeping his tone measured and civil, despite the urge to be condescending (and the prickle of panic up his spine that he's choosing to ignore), "it was all a lie. You were just obstacles to me. We were never friends."

"I know that, you dummy!" she says, with an exasperated gust of a laugh that sets Goro's teeth on edge. Then she squares her feet and plants her free hand on her hip. "But a lot has happened since then, right? Like, it just feels weird to still be calling you 'Akechi' after all of that… And, I mean, it's not like we can't try to be friends now."

What the fuck.

Goro's mind is racing, threatening to go off the rails entirely, in fact, but if he can just keep calm — at least long enough to come at this logically — then maybe he can untangle the sick mess of alarm and paranoia that's already started twisting in his gut.

First of all, what is this?

What is she trying to achieve here?

It certainly doesn't feel like a trick... What would the motivation even be? Other than cruelty, and that doesn't fit with what he knows about Ann Takamaki. And even if it did, he knows that, if nothing else, Ren is important to her, and he's important to Ren, so…

If it's not a trick, or a lie, then what is it? A genuine desire to reach out?

But why? Why would she care? And why is he only just realising that he doesn't... dislike the fact that she might?

She looks just as surprised as he is when his mouth apparently decides to take the matter into its own hands. "Fine… Ann."

If he thought that she was smiling brightly before, it's nothing compared to the megawatt grin she breaks out in now, and he has a panicky moment where he's worried that she's going to try to hug him again. Thankfully, she just bounces happily on her heels instead, swinging her basket dangerously close to a display of stacked cans as she does.

"Okay, Goro," she giggles. Like they have some kind of in-joke now.

Oh, he's regretting this already.

"That was quite lovely," Kitagawa pipes up, having somehow blended into the background until now, despite being almost six feet tall. "Of course, Goro, you are also more than welcome to refer to me as Yusuke."

Still feeling blindsided, off-kilter, and not entirely sure what the fuck just happened, Goro watches the pair of them gather their things, and then make for the other end of the store.

He can see that all of the other Thieves are already waiting for them there.

"You coming, Goro?" Takama— Ann calls over her shoulder, loudly enough that there's no way the rest of them didn't overhear.

And yes, he can see Ren's shoulders shaking in barely contained laughter, even from here.

Goro sighs deeply, and follows, thinking again of No Exit, and Garcin's last line in particular.

Eh bien, continuons...

Well then, let's get on with it…

Chapter Text

After doing some very basic recon, Futaba is starting to think that, maybe, this actually is a little like a Palace infiltration. Especially now, when they're all squished into the alleyway across from their main objective. The only thing — and it's a big thing — is that they're in the real world, and that leaves her without her Persona to buff her skills.

Which means that she's been kind of, y'know, nerfed.

But whatevs, it's cool.

She's always preferred playing on hard mode anyways.

Leaving the others to guard the entrance, she backs up a few steps, deeper into the gloom of the alley, and pulls her laptop out of her bag. The ground in here isn't super gross, but she doesn't really want to sit on it either — so she leans back against the wall, slides down the brick, and into a crouch, so that she can use the tops of her thighs as a makeshift desk.

Despite her best efforts, and even though the light in the alley is pretty dim, there's still some pretty severe glare on her display. She tries tilting the laptop screen a little on its hinge, forward, and then back… it doesn't make much of a difference, and neither does turning the laptop away from the entrance. Crap. It sucks, but she'll just have to make do. It's not like blackout blinds are exactly an option here, after all.

Maybe she can get Inari to stand over her? Make himself useful—

Distracted as her machine boots up, lickety-split, she sets about opening the programs she needs — one that will allow her to dummy her way into the WiFi in the apartment block across the street, and another that will get her into the security system. Of course, she's been in both already, multiple times, so it's just a matter of pulling up her history. Then, just to cover all of her bases, she decides to open up the building's plans as well.

So, she just needs to loop the security camera footage in the lobby, the stairwell, and the floor that Akechi's apartment is on…

(Yeah, she heard Ann and Inari calling him Goro earlier, and he can call her Futaba if he really wants to… but using anything other than Akechi for him still feels super-ultra-weird to her. It's just not happening.)

Score! She doesn't even have to loop the feed! They have the last thirty days of video backed up to an archive, so she can just yoink the file from yesterday.

Easy-peasy.

First objective complete!

The next part is gonna be tricky though.

Ren did say that he wants to play this safe — that they should try to avoid being seen — because even if there's a good chance (more than good, but whatever) that Akechi won't be recognised, that doesn't mean that their group won't draw any unwanted attention. Which means that she's supposed to make sure that they'll be able to walk through the lobby. Incognito. No witnesses allowed.

There might be a small problem with that part of the plan.

Maybe it's because this is kind of a fancy area, but, unlike the crappy building she used to live in with her mom, whoever owns these apartments has an actual concierge working at the front desk. They'll have to get past him without being seen, obvi, but it's not like they'll be able to climb through the vents to avoid him, Metaverse-style... or bust out their Personas to beat the snot out of the guy if sneaking doesn't work.

Futaba pushes her glasses up her nose, blows her bangs out of her face, and chews the inside of her cheek.

It's like she keeps running into a cognitive wall with 'This isn't the Metaverse!' printed on it in big letters, because this would be so much easier if she could just hack the dude! But still, even here in meatspace, there has to be something that she can do… something that will get him to move, something to distract him—

A shadow falls across her screen, getting rid of the glare (yay!), but also dispelling her +5 concentration buff (boo!).

Her friends understand, mostly, that when she's trying to figure out an exploit, or an enemy's weakness, that they should act like she's got her shields up, and just let her do her thing.

That's how she knows, without looking up, that it's probably Akechi.

He's supposed to be smart, right? If Ryuji and Inari can figure it out, then she feels like he should probably also get it by now? But here he is, looming over her, and craning to get a look at her screen.

She almost slams the laptop closed.

Where is Ren? Shouldn't he be holding this dingus's hand, or whatever, and keeping him out of her hair?

The lack of sleep is making her über-crabby; she really should have grabbed one of those bottles of Mad Bull before she sat down and got stuck into this.

"Modifying the security footage is one thing," he says, all thoughtful, and Futaba's eyes flit up to his face long enough to see the doofy expression on it, like he thinks he can analyse what's on her screen. Pffft, as if he has the first clue about what she's doing. "But what do you plan to do about poor old Ogawa-san at the front desk?" Okay, maybe he has some idea. Not that she's going to let him know that. "Don't you think that he might notice eight teenagers traipsing through his place of work, all while carrying a small fortune's worth of junk food? Or am I to approach him outright — really test your hypothesis and see if he recognises me after all?"

Futaba is only half listening; she's too busy thinking about the canister of compressed air on her desk at home. It's not only the best way to clean her equipment without risking water damage, no, it also works great when she has to shoo Mona away from whatever he's trying to stick his nose into. She'd give one of her limited edition Featherman figures (well, any one of them other than her fifth-anniversary edition Pink Argus, of course, duh) to have it here with her now, so she could set it off right in Akechi's face.

Just a couple of shots of air would probably do the trick. That's always been more than enough to send Mona scurrying away.

Pssssht! Pssssht! Bad Akechi!

Uh oh.

He's looking at her weird — probably because she's just sitting here, grinning to herself, and not acknowledging what he said.

Awkward.

It's all good, though. Ren's support skill has finally charged enough for him to swoop in and save the day.

"Goro," he says, taking Akechi by the arm and pulling him away gently, "give Futaba some space; she knows what she's doing."

"I don't think that I said anything that implied otherwise?" Akechi protests as they go.

Ren gives her a discreet thumbs-up behind Akechi's back, and she sends him a small salute in return.

Okay!

Back to it!

Other than the cameras, she doesn't think that she's going to get much else out of the security system. The only other part of it that seems like it might be useful, maybe, is the fire alarm, and that probably isn't an option… not if she doesn't want to draw more potential witnesses…

On a hunch, she decides to check and see if the dude's cell phone is connected to the same network as the PC at his desk.

And yep, of course it is.

Maybe she can find a family member's name in there? They could use it to call and pretend that they're contacting him from a school… or a hospital? She doesn't feel great about the idea, and the others probably wouldn't go for it anyways, but it would get him away from the desk...

She decides to set that option to 'last resort' (for now) and opens his camera roll.

Oh…

Wow.

It's full of pictures of his cat. Like 'this guy has probably had to go out and buy extra memory for his phone just to fit more cat pictures on it' kind of full.

Welp, that's their in!

"You're up, Mona!"

Morgana was grooming himself, doing that gross, cat thing where he licks his own butt, but he jolts into a normal sitting position at the sound of his name. Everyone else turns to look at her at the same time, and it's still kind of hard not to flinch at suddenly being the centre of attention, but she's really built up her resistance stat since she became a Phantom Thief, so she manages to keep her cool.

It helps that Ren is here.

She tries not to think about the fact that he'll be gone by this time tomorrow.

Her plan is pretty straightforward, D rank at most (or maybe it just feels simple compared to the triple S rank ones they've pulled off before), but still, exposition is hard, so she spins her laptop on her knees so that they can all see the dude's cat pictures, and the building's floor plan. That way they can fill in some of the gaps themselves, while she pitches her idea.

"O-okay, so this dude is like, totally obsessed with cats, right? So I figure that Mona can kite him away from the desk, and into this—" She taps the little box on the floor plan. "Back room."

"'Kite'?" Haru asks, confused.

"Uh, s-sorry, lure him away."

"So, Mona-chan distracts this man, and we sneak upstairs?"

"Pretty much, yeah. I'll take care of everything else."

"How will Morgana know when to follow us?" Makoto steps forward to lean down and look closely at the screen. "There are four flights of stairs, and a long hallway, between the lobby and Akechi-kun's apartment."

"Yeah, it, um, gets a little messy after that, but look…" Futaba switches the window with all the cat pictures to the one with the security feeds. "There's a clock in the back room… so if Mona can just put up with some pats for like, ten minutes, tops—" Morgana makes a huffing noise in the back of his throat, but Futaba keeps powering on, because she's worried that she won't be able to get it all out if she stops now. "That should give us plenty of time to get into the apartment… and Mona's fast. It shouldn't be hard for him to outrun some old guy…"

"What if Ogawa-san decides to check the security cameras to see where his new feline friend has disappeared to? Surely that will expose the fact that the footage has been tampered with?" Akechi asks, and Futaba has to hand it to him, because she had almost forgotten about that little detail herself.

Almost.

"I've got it covered," she says, "just gotta replace the feed, get into your apartment, then restore the original feed for the lobby and like, the first two floors. The cameras on the stairs have a lot of blind spots… so it will look like Mona disappeared somewhere around there. Sure, it'll look weird, but the blind spots mean that there'll be no reason for him to suspect the cameras or have any idea where Mona really went."

"What about when we have to take our leave this evening?" Inari asks. "Won't we have to sneak past this gentleman again?"

Futaba opens her mouth to answer, but Akechi speaks before she has the chance. Shocker. "Assuming that you're all happy enough to wait — the management company only has a concierge work the front desk until around ten o'clock, if I recall correctly."

Everyone is silent for a couple of seconds, and she feels the self-satisfaction that comes with knowing that she really must have accounted for everything, if nobody else (Makoto or Akechi. She means Makoto or Akechi) is jumping in with more questions.

"I don't like it," Mona grumbles. "It's not... dignified."

Futaba bites her lip against the urge to point out that he was literally licking his own butthole, like, five minutes ago.

"Sounds good to me!" Ann chips in. "It's about time that someone else had to do something like this! And at least you don't have to strip!"

Mona flinches, ears going flat against his skull. Man, Futaba can almost see the damage counter ticking down above his head — critical hit! There's some splash damage too, because Inari always looks kind of put out when he's reminded of the fact that Ann hadn't actually wanted to pose for him.

Savage.

Ryuji hums and scratches at the back of his head. "Monamona's already naked, though, right? He couldn't strip, even if he wanted to..."

Morgana makes a spluttering sound, and is obviously starting to get himself worked up into fluffy-ball-of-rage mode. Futaba knows (from experience) that they're all only seconds away from getting dragged into some dumb argument between these two boneheads — but then Ren stands up straight, from where he was leaning against the wall, and everyone is suddenly paying attention.

"It's a good plan," he says, flashing her a smile that makes her feel almost as warm and fuzzy as a pat on the head would have, and then he turns to Mona. "And it's the best option that we have, Morgana."

He doesn't say anything like 'we're doing it', or 'that's the end of the discussion' (and he probably never would), but he doesn't have to.

Mona de-puffs and sighs. "Yeah, okay, but you guys owe me so much sushi."

They go over the plan one more time, although Futaba isn't really sure why they're all crowded around and listening so intently, when it's really just going to be her and Mona that are doing all the work.

It only gets more cramped once Mona crosses the street and enters the building, with everyone huddling close around her laptop to watch the camera feed from the lobby. They're all so squished together that she's nearly surprised they're not clipping into each other.

"It's fortuitous that Ogawa-san always insists on propping the door open to let fresh air in, rain or shine," Akechi mutters, from somewhere above her head, "I doubt that Morgana would have been able to open it himse—"

"Shh!" Makoto hisses, with all the force of a souped-up librarian. Futaba can't quite stop herself from snickering, and it sounds like Ryuji has the same problem. "Morgana is approaching the desk!"

They watch as Mona trots across the lobby, reaches the desk — and there's no audio, but it's pretty obvious that he just starts yelling his furry little head off.

The old dude at the desk jerks so suddenly in his seat that he almost falls out of it and goes splat on the floor, but other than that, this part of the plan goes off without a hitch. Even if it is kind of cringey, watching Mona get nearly glomped to death.

Once their target is in the backroom and out of the lobby, Futaba quickly substitutes all the camera feeds, closes her laptop, and gives Ren a thumbs up.

"It's showtime," Ren grins, so Joker that she can almost see his mask. It should be totally lame, but he somehow makes it work.

He always does.

The perks of having a maxed out charisma stat.

The next part of the plan passes in a sweaty, out of breath blur for Futaba. Running in the real world is way harder than doing it in the Metaverse, and there are a lot of stairs. Even when they'd been grinding in Mementos, running up and down all those escalators, she'd always been able to hitch a ride inside of her Persona if she was feeling really wiped.

By the time that they finally reach the floor that Akechi's stupid apartment is on, her blood is a loud rush in her ears, and she's actually seeing spots. Her hand is shaking pretty badly when she reaches up to pull her glasses off her face, so she can mop up the worst of the sweat with the sleeve of her hoodie, and when she puts them back on, an open bottle of Dr Salt Neo has materialised in front of her face. Grabbing it, she's downed a good third of the bottle (dragging her HP bar up from flashing red to a slightly less urgent orange) before she actually registers that it didn't just appear out of thin air — that it was actually Haru that offered it to her.

"Are you alright, Futaba-chan?"

"Thanks, Haru…" She stops to take another swig of sweet, liquid energy. "Just need — just need to sit down…"

And hoo boy, does she need to sit down. Before her head, or her heart, or her lungs, or all of the above, explode! Boom! Like a disaster shadow!

But for some reason, there's a hold-up.

Turning to the beautiful, generous cleric at her side, she asks, "What's going on?"

Haru hums and taps her chin with one finger. "Honestly, I'm not sure..."

So Futaba pushes herself back to standing, ignoring the way her legs wobble in protest as she does, and makes her way to the door. Getting there just in time to catch the end of the conversation between Ren and Akechi.

"—sure they weren't there before?"

"Yes! What kind of question— of course I'm sure! And you're surprisingly naïve for someone so experienced with lock picks—"

"I've never picked a lock outside of the Metaverse; it's not the same." Ren shrugs at Akechi's eye roll, and turns to look at her. "Futaba, you said that nobody's been in and out of here for weeks, right?"

"Uh, yeah…" she answers, eyeing the nasty gouges all around the keyhole. "It should be safe now… I think."

Akechi squints at her dubiously for a handful of very uncomfy seconds before he sighs and slides his key into the lock.

It must be stiff from being messed with, because he has to really twist the key to get it to turn, and even then, he has to push at the door with his shoulder a couple of times as well before it actually pops open.

She's still close enough that she hears him mutter something that sounds like 'let's get this over with' under his breath as he marches inside, not waiting to see if the rest of them follow.

Edgy.

"You go on in, do what you need to do with those cameras," Ren says to her as the others file past them, "I'll wait here for Morgana."

Oh crud, yeah, she needs to change the feeds again, doesn't she?

"G-got it!" she stammers, and scurries in after the rest of them. Already pulling her phone out of her pocket, she opens the remote desktop app. That way, she can do what she needs to do without having to take her laptop back out of her bag.

Just a couple of taps and the cameras for the lobby and the first two floors are restored.

Continuing on, deeper into the apartment, she's wondering if Mona is going to start making his way up to meet them soon, when she walks right into Yusuke, and nearly drops her phone.

"Hey, Inari! What's the big de—"

Her mouth snaps shut as she looks up and actually sees what's all around them.

Holy smokes! It looks like a freaking bomb went off in here!

And not in the same 'messy teenager' way it used to when she was looking at it from the other end of a webcam.

Everything has been pulled from the kitchen cupboards and drawers, and swept off the countertops. A handful of plates, bowls, and cups lie scattered, chipped and broken, amongst all of the books and papers that used to be piled on top of every available surface. They nearly cover the entire floor, spread all around like the newspaper her mom used to put in the bottom of her budgie's cage. And it's not just the kitchen. Akechi's clean clothes (the only thing that Futaba can remember seeing him keep even kind of tidy), have also been pulled off their hangers, and out of drawers — left in a big pile near the end of his bed. His mattress is kind of crooked too, like it was lifted, and then just dropped haphazardly back into place.

Even the kotatsu has been tipped over, exposing the heater underneath.

Yikes.

They're all just standing there, staring, like their collective OS has crashed, when Ann speaks up.

"Hey, Goro…" He jolts at the sound of his name. "Don't worry about it, okay? We'll help you clean up, and I'm sure that you usually keep the place super neat, right?"

Futaba laughs before she can stop herself (because oh my god, if only any of them knew what this place usually looks like), and Akechi whirls around to glare at her, just as she scrambles to hide behind Inari. The manic, but also weirdly victorious, glint in his eye tells her everything she needs to know about whether he's figured out that she was watching him.

Double yikes.

"What is happening?" her tall, noodly shield asks, twisting to look back at her, and almost exposing her again in the process.

Mona chooses that exact moment to come barrelling into the apartment at top speed (followed by Ren, at a much more relaxed pace). "I'm never doing that again!" he yowls. "That guy smelled funny, and he was petting me way too hard, and— what the heck happened in here?!"

"Shido's men were obviously looking for something," Akechi answers, and it sounds like he's been successfully distracted by Hurricane Mona, so Futaba figures that she's probably safe. For now.

"Any ideas about what they were trying to find?" Ren has somehow already crossed the room, and is now standing beside Akechi. Sometimes Futaba wonders if he can teleport.

"A clue as to where I'd gone, I suppose?" Akechi shrugs with one shoulder and sighs deeply, rubbing at his temple, like he's nursing the beginnings of a headache. "Shido must have been furious, but even though they turned this place upside down, it doesn't look like it was done to send a message."

"Yeah, man, the TV's not even smashed up or anythin'," Ryuji says, looking around the room and scuffing the toe of his sneaker against the floor.

"Ryuji…" Ann says softly.

Oof…

Yeah, out of all of them, Ryuji would definitely know what it's like to have someone trash your place as a scare tactic.

Why do so many of them have shitty dads?

Futaba often thinks that life is kind of like a gacha game; the RNG is merciless, and you definitely get way more pulls if you have the money for it.

She knows that she really lucked out with Sojiro.

The atmosphere is kind of heavy now (something that keeps happening ever since Akechi came back, like he has a passive skill that drags their mood modifiers down through sheer proximity), but Ryuji rolls his shoulders, pulls up his sleeves, and reaches down to grab the edge of the toppled kotatsu.

"C'mon guys, let's do this!"

And it's like a forced reboot; everyone unfreezes and starts picking stuff up too. Ann and Ren help Akechi in the bedroom area of the apartment (occasionally, Futaba hears Ann being super enthusiastic about the brand of some of his clothes, or skincare products, or whatever), while the rest of them take care of the kitchen and the living area.

Now that they're all busy, it gives Futaba the opportunity to properly look around. It's strange to see this apartment from anything other than the angle she was used to. The laptop that she'd used to spy on him is nowhere to be seen; the little side table that it was on is bare, and she wonders if Shido's mooks took it. If they did, they must have let the battery drain completely, because she'd never been able to get back into it after Ren asked her to start looking into Akechi again in February.

Joke's on them, though, because she knows that there was jack all on it, and there definitely wasn't anything that would explain his disappearance. It's not like he planned to have his butt kicked by them and then get merked by Discount Akechi.

There are lots of other little things around the place that nobody else would notice, small parts of the damage that she knows are actually from his colossal meltdown after he thought that he'd killed Ren. There's the cupboard door that's slightly loose on its hinges, the fact that he has almost no glassware and only a couple of other dishes (because he'd smashed the rest), and she can even see the ghost of a grease stain on the ceiling, from where his takeout container had exploded after he kicked it like he was channelling a character from some crappy sports manga.

He might have figured out that she'd been watching him, but there's no reason to let him know how much she saw. For lots of reasons. And only some of them are selfish. Futaba knows that she would die of embarrassment if someone had been spying on her when she was at her lowest.

And also, y'know, the fapping.

Nope! No! She does not want to think about that now! Or ever!

Throwing herself into the task at hand, to keep her wandering brain focused on something less dangerous, Futaba's picking school books and notes up off the floor in front of the TV when something catches her eye.

The something is around the size of a shoebox, half-hidden under an open manila folder. Curiosity piqued, she sets her pile of books aside so that she can reach out and pick it up.

It's a clear plastic box — no, it's actually a perspex display case — the one that she remembers seeing through the webcam, given pride of place in the centre of his kotatsu.

The model ray-gun inside is even nicer in person.

It doesn't seem like it took any damage in the fall, although there is some surface scuffing on the gun, but that looks old, like it had probably just been played with, a lot, before finding itself on display.

"My mother bought it for me," Akechi says, from right beside her.

Futaba jumps and yelps, heart rate skyrocketing up to what feels like something in the region of a bajillion beats per second. And she nearly drops (okay, nearly throws) the box, but Akechi's quick, and he steadies it before it can fly out of her, suddenly very sweaty, palms.

"I-i-i-it's really c-cool!" she stutters, as she pushes it entirely into the safety of his hands, not trusting herself to hold it anymore.

It's bad enough that she nearly yeeted such an amazing collectable across the room, but it's a Dead Mom Gift too? Geez.

"It's such a stupid thing, but I wanted it so badly… She must have saved for it for months," he continues, all wistful. Like that time he came to Leblanc last year and info dumped about his mom all over their counter. "It's probably the only thing here that I care about, honestly."

He swipes his thumb over the clear plastic in an affectionate arch, and it hits her like a punch, right in the feels.

What the heck?

He was giving her the evil eye just a few minutes ago, and now he's being all relatable?

"I'm glad that it's okay," Akechi says, smiling at her, and the fact that it's not a full-on slasher grin or his creepy little '^_^' face catches her completely off guard.

"M-me too…"

"Hey, Goro?" Ren calls, sounding a little like he's trying not to laugh as he strolls over, and cutting right through whatever weird moment she was sharing with his dweeby boyfriend. "I've got two questions for you."

"Oh? Do you now?" Akechi is suspicious. Futaba doesn't blame him.

"First," Ren says, holding up one finger, "do you actually own a single pair of pants that don't need to be pressed before you wear them?" It's an obvious warm-up for whatever the second thing is, and he hardly pauses at all for Akechi's 'no, of course not,' before he holds up another finger, while also pulling something (small, black, and strappy) out of his pocket with his other hand. "And second, seriously, are these sock garters?"

Akechi is saying something, probably some thoroughly researched and well-thought-out argument for why that's a normal thing for an eighteen-year-old to own, but Futaba can't hear him over the wheeze of her own breath as she tries not to burst out laughing.

"Haru said there's a name for it, you know?" Ren continues, smiling innocently. "For the way you dress, I mean."

"I don't want to know," Akechi grits out.

Ren's smile has sharpened into a grin. "Grandpa Core."

She can't hold it in anymore, and the laugh forces its way out of her lungs in a really dumb-sounding honk, but she doesn't care. Oh my god. Grandpa Core!

"Give me the garters, Ren," Akechi says, dangerously calm. "I'm going to strangle you with them."

Chapter Text

Peering up at the ceiling above him with bleary eyes, Ren blinks slowly and deliberately, trying to understand why it's all bright, white paint, and tiny chrome spotlights, instead of dusty attic beams and a string of (equally dusty) exposed bulbs. He shifts a little in place, straightens his legs, and wiggles his toes, stretching some of the sleepy stiffness out of his muscles, and in the process, realises that there's springy tatami underneath him...

Why is he on the floor?

His glasses are also sitting weirdly on his face, digging unpleasantly into the meat of his left cheek — which, he guesses, is what he gets for falling asleep with them on. Reaching up to straighten them, with a hand that feels heavy and uncoordinated, he misses his mark twice, only really managing to mash them further into the bridge of his nose, before he gives it up as a lost cause, and decides to pull them off altogether.

Folding his glasses (clumsily), and setting them down on the floor beside him, he lets his eyes slide closed again. Still struggling to get his bearings, he becomes aware of a faint humming sound, like an electric pump, and the muffled hiss of running water.

A shower?

Definitely not Leblanc, then.

It takes another handful of confused seconds, and bumping his knees on the underside of the kotatsu he didn't remember being under, before his brain catches up.

Oh, yeah.

This is Goro's apartment.

...

He's in Goro's apartment!

Giddy disbelief bubbles up in his chest as everything that's happened in the last twenty-four hours comes back to him. It might not be quite as strong as it was when he woke up (this morning? Yesterday? What time is it?) and found Goro in his bed, but it's not far off, and the sheer, simple happiness that washes over him has him covering his face with his hands and grinning into them like a total dork.

He knows where he is now.

Which is always a good start.

But the nap is still hanging over him like a warm, fuzzy fog. He feels slow, and disoriented.

Ren's sense of time is so shot, in fact, that when he checks his phone and sees that it's not even midnight yet (he's been asleep for almost an hour, oops), his internal clock is still convinced that he must have slept through to the next morning.

For as long as he can remember, he's always had a hard time waking up (before Morgana came into his life, of course, and he learned just how difficult it was to sleep through being yowled at and pricked all over with sharp little claws… Ren loves Morgana, but still, sometimes he wishes that Igor had decided to include a snooze button), so he knows, from experience, that staying like this isn't going to help. That the best thing he can do to clear his head is to try and get moving.

Easier said than done, though.

It feels like he's fighting his way through quicksand, or that there are lead weights strapped to his arms and legs, as he pushes himself up into a sitting position. Rubbing his eyes and stretching helps… a little. Knocking back the rest of the half-empty (and already going flat) bottle of Manta on the kotatsu in front of him helps a bit more.

There's a pack of gum there too, and he unwraps and shoves a couple of the minty sticks into his mouth for good measure. He doesn't feel like he has morning breath or anything, but it couldn't hurt to freshen up, after all the junk food and sushi he's eaten today.

He scrubs his hand across his face again, rough enough to shake off a few more mental cobwebs, before looking around the room.

It took a whole lot of work, and a tonne of elbow grease, but the apartment around him is clean and tidy. The vast majority of Goro's stuff (clothes, books, and not much else) have been boxed up and should be sitting safely in Leblanc's attic by now.

Ren thinks back, to when Sojiro pulled him aside earlier, and (in that awkward way of his) offered to keep 'that Akechi kid's' things safe for him, at least until he found something more permanent ('and it's not like anyone'll be using the attic anymore anyway'). Ren had tried to thank him, but Sojiro just waved him off, and turned to duck back into the café.

Not before Ren caught a glimpse of just how misty-eyed he'd gone, of course.

Something twists in his chest, and he feels suddenly very alone, even though Goro is, literally, only a handful of feet away in the bathroom... Letting himself think about Sojiro, and how much he's going to miss him, was probably a mistake.

It's making tomorrow's journey home that much harder to ignore.

That, and the fact that he was supposed to finish packing his own stuff today.

It's fine though.

Probably.

All of his clothes are already in a box anyway, and it's not like he really needs any of the stuff that he used to use to make infiltration tools (though it would be kind of funny to see Mom and Dad's reactions to all those lock picks and smoke bombs), but other than that, there isn't really much else that needs to be packed. Just that old console he got from the second-hand shop, his souvenir collection, and his crane game winnings... and they'll take what? Ten — maybe fifteen — minutes to wrap in some paper and box up?

No big deal.

Something that is kind of a big deal, though, is the other thing that he was going to do today…

It's just… Ren had been having such a great time with his friends (and his not-dead maybe-boyfriend), and pretending that it wasn't his last day, that he kind of forgot about all the other people he's become close with in the last year (y'know, the ones without superpowers), and how he was supposed to find them all today, and say goodbye.

He really should have been able to make some time for them.

But there's nothing he can do about it now, though, right? It's too late at night to even text anyone, other than maybe Iwai, or Ohya...

The shower is still running, and Ren isn't really sure what to do with himself while he's waiting for Goro to be done, other than be disappointed that he didn't get the chance to join him (both for sexy reasons, and because it would have been a great way to distract himself from feeling crappy about being a bad friend), so he just leans back on the heels of his hands and lets his eyes wander around the room again.

Unfortunately, it hasn't magically become more interesting in the couple of minutes since he last looked around. The place still feels empty, unlived in... Which makes sense, since the only things left, other than the furniture, are the overnight bag with Goro's essentials inside, and what's left of their 'welcome' party: three garbage bags (one of the few household necessities that Goro had actually had in his mostly empty cupboards) propped up against the wall. Each one of them filled to the brim with empty chip bags, chocolate wrappers, plastic bottles, soda cans, and takeout cartons from the crazy expensive sushi restaurant that Haru had insisted on.

(Morgana had eaten so much that Ren is kind of surprised that he didn't explode.)

Haru had also insisted on paying for everything (despite Ren's protests) and then, somehow, convinced her driver to not only go and pick their order up from the restaurant, but to also lie his way past the concierge at the front desk.

Ren really hopes that Haru pays that man well, because he'd looked a little like he was about to have a heart attack when, a few hours later, they'd brought down all the boxes (and a couple of repurposed grocery bags) of Goro's stuff, and started trying to squeeze them all into the polished interior of the fancy car. It was a tight fit, but they'd managed it, somehow, and while Haru herself had been able to sit up front, in the passenger seat, it had become pretty clear that there was going to be nowhere near enough room for the rest of them in the back. Luckily, there had still been just enough space for Futaba to squeeze in, and nobody had said it out loud, but he's sure that they were all thinking about what a relief it was that she wouldn't be forced into taking the subway again.

Ren had been getting ready to say goodbye goodbye to Haru (and Futaba, kind of, but he'll probably be seeing her again, in the morning, when he has to go back to Leblanc to grab his stuff), and he may even have been starting to get a little choked up, when Makoto said that she needed to talk to him.

It turns out that they'd been planning to catch him tomorrow, on his way to the train station, for a final send-off. As a surprise.

Ren appreciated the thought, of course, even while he didn't miss the way they were all being super shifty about the whole thing. Like there was some other part of their plan that they were leaving out… but he's more than content to wait and find out what's going on there when they're all ready. Really, he's just happy that the proper goodbyes have been pushed out to tomorrow.

Once Haru and Futaba were in the car, and after it disappeared out of sight, everyone else had started talking about going to catch the last train. Which was when Goro had leaned in and whispered in his ear… and well, Ren doesn't really remember the specifics, because he'd been more focused on the tone, and how just the hot puff of Goro's breath on his ear had made him feel like there was fire under his skin. Needless to say, though, it had been a very convincing argument for why he should suggest that Morgana go stay with Ann for the night, and then tell the rest of his friends that they could go on ahead to the train station without him.

Morgana, for his part, had seemed even happier than he normally would at the prospect of spending time with Lady Ann, and Ren couldn't blame him after what happened (and what he pretty much definitely overheard) last night. They still haven't spoken about it properly, and maybe they won't. Ren can't decide if he'd prefer to avoid the awkward conversation entirely, or if Morgana's reaction might be worth the embarrassment.

It took a little longer for the penny to drop for the rest of his friends, and they'd just stared at Ren for a couple of seconds, like he'd suddenly sprouted a second head, before the reason he wasn't going with them finally sunk in.

Yusuke said something Very Yusuke (including such choice phrases as: 'sublimation of love' and 'exploration of the physical') that had Ann giggling behind her hand and made Makoto go so red that Ren had actually been kind of worried that she might faint.

Goro had just looked unimpressed, on the surface, but Ren was close enough to see the colour in his cheeks.

Then, last but not least, he'd been on the receiving end of the most awkward, but sincere, fist bump from Ryuji. It made Ren smile so hard that he's surprised his cheeks aren't still hurting from it.

There had been something heart-warming, and relieving about still being treated like Ryuji's bro, even though he was with another guy. He had no reason to think that Ryuji was going to be weird about it, not really, but still, he had been kind of worried that it would change things between them.

After they said goodnight, and his friends left for the train station, he'd come back up to the apartment, with Goro, and Ren had been buzzing with anticipation — his heartbeat a fluttery, erratic thing, pulsing distractingly through him as the door clicked closed behind them. But once they were inside, Goro had insisted that they finish cleaning the place up 'first', with the promise of what was 'second' hanging heavy in the air between them.

So they'd cleared away the last of the mess from dinner, and what was left of the junk food, all while Goro kept giving him these little meaningful looks while they were doing it. Fake-bashful things that barely concealed the smug, and slightly predatory, glint in his eye.

But by the time they were actually finished cleaning? They'd both been completely wiped (and in fairness, Goro has been back for like, a day, and a lot has happened in that time), and what was meant to be a quick rest at the kotatsu had, seemingly, ballooned into a full-on nap.

In Goro's apartment.

It still feels kind of surreal.

Ren didn't think that he'd ever see where Goro lived.

Sure, he'd thought about it — he'd fantasised about it — of course he had. Spending more than one lonely evening, hiding from Morgana in Leblanc's bathroom, imagining being brought back to big apartments, tiny box apartments, apartments filled with clutter, and ones that were kept freakishly pristine.

It wasn't like the apartment was the point of the fantasies, but Ren has always needed a little window dressing in his jerk off material. A bit of a story. Something to set the mood.

The real thing (fittingly) turned out to be both nothing and exactly like he'd imagined it to be.

When he'd walked through the door, the first thing that Ren had noticed was that it was pretty small (or maybe it was actually big by Tokyo standards?), but still fancy, with a high-tech fridge (the kind with big double doors, and a little smart display that tells you its temperature, and even what the weather outside is like), and a pricey-looking stove that Sojiro would probably kill a man for. The second thing he noticed was that Goro must have been being honest when he admitted, on one of their earlier visits to Jazz Jin, to not being able to cook, because the kitchen looked like it had never been used. Or at least, that was the case for the parts of it that Ren could actually see.

Underneath the dust.

And the rest of the mess.

It hadn't even been about the place being turned upside down, no — because Ren knows the difference between stuff that's been pulled out of wherever it was being neatly stored, and stuff that probably already looked like a trash heap before it got thrown around.

For example, there had been opened letters, and what had to have been months worth of junk mail scattered amongst the school notes and assignments on the kitchen floor.

Ren had had to bite at the inside of his cheeks to stop the smile that kept trying to creep across his face. Because the whole thing was pretty funny, but it would also probably have been kind of dick-ish, to stand there and laugh about it.

Maybe it would have been easy to just write Goro off as a bit of a slob (and then spend some time thinking of the best way to make fun of him for it), but it wasn't actually that simple. Once they got stuck into tidying his clothes, Ren caught a glimpse of the neat freak on the other side of the Goro coin.

Shido's goons might have yanked the majority of Goro's clothes off their hangers, emptied most of the drawers, and left everything in a big heap on the floor, but when Ren picked a white dress shirt out of the pile, its material was still crisp and starched under his fingers. Also, every single pair of pants seemed to have a sharp crease ironed into the legs.

Which might not seem like a big deal taken alone, because everyone knows that Goro is very particular about his appearance. But after Ren had spent ten minutes folding what felt like a million pairs of boring, black boxer briefs (which would, obviously, be much less boring if they were actually on Goro, but seriously, does he buy them in bulk or something? They're all identical), he pulled open the topmost drawer of the bureau to make sure that he'd gotten them all, and came face to face with something that definitely threatened to cross the thin line between 'fussy' and 'obsessive'.

The drawer had been, surprisingly, only half emptied, and two lines of perfectly folded socks had survived the ransacking — and they were folded, not rolled up into the inside-out balls that most people (or at least, most people that Ren knows) keep their socks in. They were also sorted by colour, arranged in a graduated palette from black to mid-grey (with the occasional splash of argyle on the ankle, to really mix things up), like they'd just come off the conveyor belt in a factory.

He'd be lying if he said that he didn't think it was actually kind of endearing, on top of being hilarious, but he'd been quickly distracted by the two belt things he found in the back of the drawer, and how much they looked like tiny versions of the belts on Goro's Black Mask outfit. Haru had stepped in then — explaining to him that they were sock garters, and then about how there's an entire subculture of people that wear that kind of stuff. Like the flashy kids in Harajuku, only way more lame.

Ren thinks that it was a strangely anticlimactic moment for the last of his uncertainty about his feelings to disappear, and for him to be left with the realisation that, yep, he really is completely and utterly in love with Goro Akechi.

Old man sense of style and all.

Not that he'd had the time to really give it any thought, because it also happened to be when he'd noticed that Goro had drifted away (from where he had been showing off his expensive coat collection to Ann), over to the other side of the apartment, and right into cornering one very nervous-looking Futaba—

The shower stops running.

Ren's heart kicks into overdrive.

Suddenly full of nervous energy, he gets up and brushes himself off, spits his (now mostly flavourless) wad of gum into one of the discarded wrappers, balls it up, and throws it at the closest garbage bag. It sails through the air like a little silver basketball and lands perfectly in the opening of one of the soda cans at the top of the bag.

Morgana's voice chirps in the back of his mind, 'Lookin' cool, Joker!'

Ren laughs to himself under his breath, and it feels a little like some of his anxiety leaves his lungs along with it.

Honestly, he's not even really sure why he's so nervous — especially after everything that's already happened between them. But it's probably got something to do with the build-up, right? Because he'd been all full of Joker's suave and confidence last night when he made the first move, and then this morning, in his bed, it had felt natural. Organic.

But now...

No, yeah, it has to be the waiting.

And definitely not the fact that he feels a little bit like anything that they do now might be the last time they do it.

Nope.

Because that's just dumb, right?

Ren shoves his hands into his pockets, bites his lip, and tilts his head to the side as he strains his ears to try and pick up any sound from the next room.

He can definitely hear movement, along with the occasional plasticky snap of some product or other being opened. Ren knows that some people like to spend a little more time on their skincare than he does (he usually just slaps some lotion on his knees and elbows, and he's good to go), but what exactly Goro could be doing in there (and why it's taking so long) is a mystery to him.

What he does know is that the anticipation is nearly killing him, and he finds himself pacing back and forth, between Goro's bed and the kotatsu, and back again.

Speaking of the bed, they'd stripped it earlier — folded Goro's bedclothes up, and packed them away with his other things — and the bare mattress, topped with the equally naked pillows and duvet, might seem uninviting to some people. But to Ren? Given what he's used to sleeping on? It might as well be one of those big, fancy beds they'd seen in the brochures when they visited the buffet at the Wilton.

He's getting ahead of himself, though, and he spins on his heel to wander back to the centre of the room, pulling his phone back out of his pocket. Needing to have something to do with his hands.

The bathroom door opens (finally) just as Ren finishes using his forward-facing camera to give himself a quick once-over, and he nearly drops the phone on the floor as Goro steps out in a cloud of steam. Wearing nothing but a towel slung low around his hips, his hair is still slightly damp, making it look half a shade darker than usual, and his skin seems to glow under the spotlights, all flushed pink and dewy.

He's beautiful, and perfect, and Ren feels all kinds of gooey just looking at him — like he's going to melt right into the tatami, make a huge mess, and undo everyone's hard work.

"Ah!" Goro gasps softly, sounding mildly surprised, but clearly pleased. "You're finally awake."

There's probably something charming, or at least witty, that he could say in response. Some cheeky quip that would throw Goro off balance and make him blush. But Ren feels like his brain stutters and trips over itself when he tries to think of something — caught in a tug of war between his pounding heart and his (already half-hard) dick — and all he gets out is a slightly breathy "Wow."

The first time they fooled around, Goro had been aggressive, and kind of mean, but then, this morning, when they'd actually had sex sex, he'd been surprisingly tender. Ren has no idea what's in store for him tonight — only that he wants Goro to take control again, make it so he can hardly remember his own name, let alone the gnawing apprehension that's decided to keep the butterflies in his stomach company.

There's a beat, a little blip in time, where they just kind of stare at each other, and Ren tries to convey how he's feeling through the force of his gaze alone (because he doesn't think he could ever say it out loud), before Goro smiles at him, soft and sweet, his eyes sparkling with something sharp and knowing. Ren isn't sure if he really did figure it out just by looking at him, or if it's just a coincidence, but the end result is the same, and he finds himself awash with a bewildering mixture of cool relief and burning arousal, as Goro crosses the room to join him.

"What was the extremely eloquent way that you put it last night? Hmm?" Goro asks, voice smooth as silk wrapped around a blade. He hooks two fingers into the belt loops on the front of Ren's jeans and uses them to tug him close, stopping just short of bringing their hips together. Ren's nostrils flare at the action, and his nose is immediately filled with the smell of vanilla, sandalwood, and musk. "'Like what you see?'"

That surprises a gasp of a laugh out of Ren, and Goro's smile goes a little less TV and a little more crooked. More genuine. Ren loves it almost as much as he loves the boy wearing it. "You could say that, yeah."

Goro makes an amused huff through his nose as he leans in and presses their lips together. Ren can still feel the smile there, in the way their mouths fit together, until the kiss starts to escalate — until it's all tongues and teeth, and Ren feels like he's about to burst into flames.

And for some reason, other than just because he's kind of a sadistic asshole, Goro keeps his hands in the space between them, still holding onto his belt loops like a vice. When Ren tries to push forward, seeking even the slightest bit of friction, Goro just presses his thumbs (not gently) into his hip bones to stop him.

Undeterred, Ren switches tactics, sliding his hands from where they were resting on Goro's hips, across the smooth skin of his lower back, and along the edge of the towel, just above the swell of his ass. But just as Ren starts to slip his fingers underneath the fluffy fabric, Goro twists out of his grasp. Stepping back, he actually pushes Ren away from him, and he's wearing the widest, shittiest, triumphant smirk on his face while he does it.

There are all kinds of confusing things happening in Ren's addled brain right now. He wants to touch Goro; he wants to be touched. He hates the teasing; he loves the teasing. He really loves Goro.

It almost tumbles out of his mouth right then and there.

"Not yet," Goro tuts, and Ren has a brief, fluttery moment where he thinks that Goro might have, somehow, actually read his mind, before he realises that he's just being told to keep his hands to himself. For now. Then, looking him up and down, Goro taps his chin with one finger — thoughtfully, like he's choosing something off a menu. "Take your clothes off and get on the bed."

Ren doesn't need to be told twice.

Long past the point of caring if he seems overeager, he yanks his turtleneck over his head with one hand, unceremoniously, while he pulls his belt loose with the other.

Goro keeps the distance between them while Ren gets undressed, but he watches him closely the entire time, so intense that it feels like he's trying to eat him with his eyes. Part of Ren wants to play it up, turn some of the teasing back on Goro, but his dick has a very strong opinion about doing anything that might slow things down now.

It's only once Ren is completely naked that Goro finally drops his towel to the floor, and Ren very nearly follows it. His brain suddenly full of nothing but the memory of that perfect dick against his tongue, and the salty twang of pre-cum in the back of his throat... But, before he has the chance to pursue his lofty blowjob-related aspirations, Goro catches him by the shoulders and turns him in the direction of the bed.

"Hey!" Ren cries out in mock offence, at the same time that Goro says, "Get moving."

Just as forceful as he was this morning, Goro manhandles him across the room, and then pushes and prods at Ren's chest and shoulders until he's laid out on the mattress. Goro comes with him, one hand on Ren's sternum to keep him in place as he straddles his hips, once again making sure to leave a maddening inch of space between them. Ren could probably close the gap if he rolled his hips, but he's distracted by the devious glint in Goro's eye, and how the smirk on his face has gone knife-sharp around the edges — almost cruel. Is Goro going to fuck him like this? Pound him into the mattress so hard that he'll be feeling it for days afterwards? Ren's dick throbs at the thought, and his heart manages to dig deep and find a way to somehow beat even faster than it already was.

Goro is saying something. Ren knows this because he's watching those pretty lips form the words. Watching how they wrap around each syllable, the same way they'd been wrapped around him this morning—

"Ren."

Ren drags his eyes up to meet Goro's, where dark amusement has joined the slightly menacing intensity. "Hmm?"

"Under. The. Pillow." Goro enunciates each word slowly, and his tone is dripping with mocking condescension. It really shouldn't be as hot as it is.

Ren does as he's told (which is something that he never thought he'd enjoy as much as he does) and reaches back to slip his hand under the pillow. His fingers bump against something almost immediately. It's about the same size and shape as a squeezy tube of toothpaste, and once he's pulled it free, Ren holds it up in the air so that he can peer at the label.

There are two large Roman letters, 'J' and 'Y', printed on it, with 'personal lubricant' written out in Japanese underneath. No coconut oil this time then, Ren thinks, and snorts a laugh. "How did you hide this here without one of the others noticing?"

"It was a calculated risk," Goro says, shrugging one shoulder and not sounding concerned in the least. Ren laughs again, in fond disbelief this time.

Holding his left hand out, palm up, Goro flexes his fingers at him in an obvious 'gimme' gesture. Ren presses the tube into his hand, watches Goro pop the cap open with his thumb and squeeze a generous amount onto his palm, and wonders when they're going to switch up the position — because it's not like Goro can fuck him while they're like this, right?

His train of thought gets blown off the tracks entirely when Goro slides warm, slippery fingers around his neglected dick. Stroking excruciatingly slow, with teasing, featherlight movements that don't really do anything for him, other than getting him completely covered in lube.

Ren balls his hands into fists and bites his lip against the whine that tries to come out of him.

Smiling down at him indulgently — magnanimously — Goro finally stops messing around, tightening his grip, and starting to pump his dick faster. Ren throws his head back against the pillow, eyes screwed shut, as pleasure spikes through him.

Goro chuckles, sweet, dark, and vindictive. "We're going to try something different tonight."

"Y-yeah?" Ren manages, and it comes out so breathless that he sounds like he's been out running with Ryuji for hours, uphill and against the wind, because holy shit that feels amazing, but he's also got a pretty good idea about what 'something different' means.

"How about we make things interesting?" Goro says lightly, like they're discussing the weather, instead of heavily hinting that he's going to sit on Ren's dick.

"More interesting than they already are?"

Goro makes a humming noise in the back of his throat, and Ren jolts when he swipes the pad of his thumb across his weeping slit. "First of all, you don't touch me—" Ren opens his mouth to protest, but Goro gives him a warning squeeze. "You don't touch me, not until we're done. Secondly, you can't come until I say you can. Do you understand?"

He still kind of wants to argue the point, but he also really wants to get off.

"I think I can—" Ren probably sounds like he's pretty sure of himself, at the start, but Goro is already moving — up off his knees and onto his feet so that he can crouch over Ren instead, right over his dick — and his voice goes a bit small and strained, halfway through what was supposed to be a show of confidence. "Manage that…"

"We'll see," Goro taunts, grinning like a shark as he reaches behind himself, and down, to grasp the base of Ren's erection again, getting ready to line it up with—

And Ren suddenly remembers how careful Goro was with him this morning, the way he'd taken his time with him, opening him up with his fingers — making sure that he was ready. "Wait — wait a second, Goro!"

Goro exhales sharply through his nose and looks back up, exasperation, concern, and maybe even a touch of anxiety in his expression. "What? What's wrong?"

"Don't you need to be... y'know…" Ren sighs, chewing on his bottom lip as he tries to find the right word, "prepared…?"

"Oh, don't worry," Goro chuckles dismissively, the fleeting tension bleeding back out of the line of his shoulders, until he's nothing but cocksure and confident again. "I took care of that already."

Brain short-circuiting, Ren makes a strangled sound in the back of his throat.

That explains why Goro had taken so long in the bathroom earlier. Just the thought of what he was doing in there is something that Ren knows is going to fuel his jerk off fantasies for months to come. "You, uh… took care of it?"

"Yes, well, I needed to," Goro explains, saccharine and patronising. Ren only dimly registers that there's something dangerous hiding underneath, "if I wanted to see the look on your face when I did this."

And then, before Ren can even start to process what that's supposed to mean, Goro sinks down onto his dick, completely sheathing him in one slick, smooth movement. There's no resistance, only a blindingly tight, wet heat, and a shock of pleasure so intense that Ren sees actual stars.

It suddenly feels like there's not enough air in the room. Ren's head is swimming — Ren is drowning — and when he finally remembers how to breathe, it comes out in a shaky rattle of a groan as he clutches fruitlessly at the mattress beneath him.

Goro is watching him intently, with wide, fierce, victorious eyes, and he might be a little more composed for not being caught off guard the way that Ren was, but he's clearly not unaffected either. His pupils are blown wide, the flush on his cheeks extending all the way down his neck and across the plane of his chest, all pretty mottled pink. Ren's eyes keep going, lower, and lower, past the trembling muscles in his stomach, drawn in by the twitch of Goro's dick, and god, he looks so painfully hard, angry, red, and literally drooling pre-cum.

Ren swallows thickly, then inhales deeply through his nose. If it's already this good, how the hell is he supposed to last once Goro starts moving?

"Oh, that was even better than I'd — ah! — hoped it would be," Goro laugh-pants through a slightly manic-looking grin. He runs his hands up Ren's stomach, over his chest, leaving behind a trail of goosebumps. "It felt like winning."

Ren's hands twitch at his sides, because he's desperate to reach out and touch Goro too, yeah, but he's also kind of getting into the game Goro's playing — he's at a disadvantage, sure, there's no escaping that, but he won't give up so easily. "You haven't won yet."

Goro's eyes narrow, but his smile only widens. "Don't disappoint me, Joker."

There's no chance to respond — Ren is only given half a second to wonder if he should have kept his mouth shut altogether — because that's when Goro shifts his weight to brace his hands against Ren's shoulders, and starts to pull himself up in an agonisingly slow drag, almost coming off Ren's dick entirely, before sliding back down again. And again. The dizzying pace he sets leaves Ren feeling like he's losing his mind, clinging desperately to the remaining scraps of his self-control as well as the mattress beneath them.

It had taken a few minutes, at least, for Ren to get used to being fucked, but Goro doesn't seem to need any time to adjust. He's a natural. Like he was made to ride Ren to within an inch of his life.

And Ren might not have lost yet — might have managed to hang on by a thread so far — but he is lost. Lost in the sensation. Lost to the sight of Goro above him — the flex of the muscles in his legs, the way he tosses his head back to get the hair out of his eyes, the flash of tongue as he licks his lips. The sound of him, grunting and moaning above him, swearing and growling one second and heart-achingly sincere the next.

Ren's not as loud, but there's a constant stream of babbled, almost incoherent, praise tumbling out of his mouth — telling Goro how good he feels, how good he is, how perfect. Each sweet word of encouragement makes the smooth glide of Goro's hips stutter and his dick jerk and dribble.

God, Ren thinks he might actually go insane if he can't touch him soon.

"You — ah! You look so good like this, Ren," Goro gasps out, hand dropping to stroke his own dick for the first time since they started. It makes his asshole flutter and clench, and Ren really is whining now, whimpering — he needs Goro to put him out of his misery. "So desperate, so wretched — all for me—"

"Yes, yes, yes—"

"Do you — hah — want to come inside me?"

"Yes, oh my god, yes!"

There's a flash of teeth as Goro's lip hitches up in a sneer. "Then beg."

"Please, Goro, please let me—"

"Do it, do it!"

Being on the edge for so long makes Ren almost worried that he won't be able to, but sweet relief floods him as the tension burning like a brand in his gut releases, and then he's coming, harder than he thinks he ever has. An overwhelming surge of emotion pulses through him at the same time, and he feels like he's actually shaking apart. It's too much. Tears prickle and sting at the corners of his eyes. But then Goro is there, sliding a hand into the hair at the back of his neck, and he's kissing him — finally — riding Ren through his orgasm, all while he works himself furiously in the space between them with his other hand. Movements going stiff and jerky as he follows Ren over the edge.

"I love you," Ren whispers between kisses, and Goro makes a choked sound somewhere between a sob and a moan into his mouth. Ren can feel tears on his face, and he's not sure who they belong to. "I love you, Goro."

Chapter Text

Their evening was perfect. Goro had made absolutely certain that it was perfect (well, as much as he could, with the limited time and resources available to him), and everything had, essentially, gone exactly as he'd hoped it would. But there seems to be a rule — some new universal law — that if, after meeting Ren Amamiya, Goro has the audacity to try to plan ahead, then he will inevitably have the metaphorical rug pulled out from under him.

Because, no matter how cunning Goro might think he's being, Ren always seems to find a way to turn his expectations on their head.

It's a thought that's echoing somewhere, far away, in the very back of his mind, as the aftershocks fade, and the gravity of what Ren just whispered to him really sinks in.

"I love you," Ren said, like it was easy.

"I love you," Ren said, as if Goro is deserving.

"I love you, Goro," Ren said, and god, it sounded like he meant it.

Ren is still kissing him, and Goro knows that he's crying — that they both are — and this would normally be the point when Goro would start to feel like there's a gaping void in his chest, some yawning, despairing thing that wants nothing more than to swallow him whole. It's still there, of course, lurking in the shadows… he can feel it, waiting for its turn to pounce and try to pop his good cheer like a balloon, but the thing is, there's also something different now. Something bright in the afterglow. Heavy, and sweet, and warm — blooming behind his breastbone and singing through his veins — not unlike the first time he'd been on the receiving end of a healing spell (from Ren. Of course it was from Ren) in the Metaverse.

When he'd been reminded of what it was like to actually have someone there to catch him when he fell.

And now, perhaps it's just the high of his orgasm that makes him brave, or reckless, but it's as if the words have just been biding their time, sitting under his tongue until the right opportunity presented itself, because they're spilling from him now, nearly of their own accord. "I love you, Ren," Goro whispers back, over and over again, like a prayer.

Ren's hands are on his neck, his jaw, his cheeks — fingers bracketing his face, and Goro can feel him smile against his mouth, a joyful, blissful curve that makes his heart soar.

It's as if a weight has been lifted from him. One that he'd become so used to carrying that he isn't quite sure how to feel now that it's gone. Bewildered and lost certainly, but for once, not alone.

Is he entitled to this kind of contentment? Not at all. Not even slightly. Not after every shitty thing that he's done. But Ren seems to think he is, for some unfathomable reason, and Goro is beginning to think that, perhaps, that could be enough.

And it's not as if fighting against it has gotten him anywhere, has it?

Eventually, they have to pull apart. Even the romantic nature of the moment can't make them any less sticky, or awkwardly positioned, or do anything about the fact that all the crying has left them both bleary-eyed and congested.

Goro winces as he lifts his hips, slowly and gingerly, so that Ren's cock can slip free before he rolls to the side. The muscles in his thighs burn wonderfully, like he's been cycling his bike for hours, and there's a pleasant, dull ache in his ass that makes him feel… marked, claimed, owned. He secretly hopes it will last long after Ren has left.

After cleaning up with the box of tissues and bottle of hand sanitiser (things that Goro had made sure were easily accessible from the bed earlier, along with the lube), they settle back down beside each other. Arms and legs sliding into an easy tangle, their bodies slot together like they've been doing it forever. It's a small thing, but it's also reassuring, affirming, like this might actually be something that he's supposed to have.

Or, at the very least, that he might be allowed to have.

Now that they're not nose to nose anymore, Goro can actually get a good look at Ren's face, and it's entirely unfair (but also completely on-brand for Ren) that he can still manage to be so obnoxiously pretty, even while he's all blotchy and red-eyed. There's something extremely intimate about being able to see him like this — so vulnerable — maybe even more so than witnessing the look of blissful agony on his face when he comes.

Ren sniffles a little, and audibly swallows, seeming just as overcome as he is. He smiles at Goro, soft and gentle, before reaching out to tuck a lock of hair behind his ear.

"So…" Ren starts, and he's still smiling, but he also seems somewhat unsure.

"So?" Goro repeats. He doesn't know what's coming, but he's relatively confident that it won't be something unpleasant. Relatively.

"Are we…?" Ren worries at his bottom lip for a second with his teeth, endearingly, and uncharacteristically nervous. Goro wants to kiss him again. "Uh, y'know… boyfriends?"

It's so normal, so mundane, that Goro almost laughs — completely caught off guard, both by the question itself and by just how much he likes the sound of the word coming out of Ren's mouth. Not that he's rushing to show how affected he is, mind you, so he just smiles his best smile and says, "If you'd like us to be — then yes, I suppose that's acceptable."

Ren sighs, relieved, and then chuckles softly, fondly. "You know that you could just say yes, right? You don't have to be an asshole about it."

"I did say yes, first of all," Goro huffs, playing along, and ignoring the slight tug in his chest as a little of his genuine insecurity bleeds into the act, "and secondly, you're the one who chose to be here with me, so my 'being an asshole' probably says more about you than it does me."

"Maybe…" Ren half-shrugs, and interrupts himself with an impressively long yawn. "But I wouldn't have it any other way."

Goro's throat feels tight, his eyes are burning, and for fuck's sake, he really does not want to start crying again, so he scrambles to change the subject before his tear-ducts take matters into their own hands. "I'd tell you that you're more than welcome to make use of my shower, Ren, but, ah, you don't seem to be in any hurry to get up."

"Nah, I'm too comfy," Ren mumbles sleepily, and then — as if to prove the point — he wriggles closer, until his head is tucked right under Goro's chin, "and I figure if I wait 'til the morning, then we can shower together this time."

Goro snorts a laugh and tries to ignore how disgustingly wet it sounds. "Oh? You 'figure'?"

"Yeah, I do," Ren says, simple and confident, and Goro thinks he might feel him smirk against his collarbone. "Maybe you can show me what half the stuff in there is even for."

"I hardly think that the fact I use a separate shampoo and conditioner—" and a hair mask, and body polish, and a facial cleansing brush, and— "—warrants much of an explanation."

Ren doesn't reply.

Heavy and limp against Goro's side, Ren's breathing has gone deep and even, having — for the second night in a row — fallen asleep first. Unlike last night, however, Goro does actually feel like he might also be able to get to sleep himself. So (carefully, so as not to disturb Ren) he pulls the duvet up around them, and settles back against the pillow.

Perhaps he is slightly too warm, and the lights are still on (because it's not as if he's in a position to get up and turn them off), and letting Ren stay where he is will mean that Goro will almost certainly wake up with a dead arm and a crick in his neck… but still, Ren was right, it is extremely comfortable. Unusually so.

Goro doesn't think he could move, even if he wanted to, because his head feels too light — like it might detach and float away if he tried.

Oh.

It came upon him so gradually, and in a manner that's so different from when he was forcibly pulled into the Velvet Room last night, that he almost missed it. Now that he has noticed it, though, it's impossible to ignore, and the contrast is stark. This feels a little like sinking into a warm bath, particularly when compared to his previous experience, which had been more like being blindfolded, kicked in the stomach, and then dragged violently down a steep and rocky hill.

The world bends around him, tilting on its axis as his eyes slide closed, and when he's allowed to open them again, he finds himself dressed (thankfully) in his uniform, and perched on the guest's couch on the replica TV set. The harsh studio lighting beats down on him, not quite as hot as it would be in reality, but still bright enough that it almost obscures the fact that there's no one manning the cameras, as well as the row after row of empty seats in the audience.

This space isn't quite as repulsive as its real-life counterpart (mostly by virtue of the aforementioned empty seats), and Goro might even be inclined to wonder why the Velvet Room appears this way to him at all, if he hadn't already seen the jail that serves as Ren's. The TV studio in Akasaka Mitsuke might not be a prison cell — it would be melodramatic to even begin to suggest otherwise — but he'd be lying if he said that it didn't make him feel claustrophobic, and trapped, all the same.

Theodore sits across from him, in the host's place again, hands clasped neatly together on top of the ornate book in his lap. His outfit is slightly different — still blue, of course — but what he's wearing now is less bellboy, and more like something you'd see in one of those embarrassing butler cafés. Goro can't decide if it's an improvement.

There's still no sign of Igor.

"Good evening, and welcome to the Velvet Room, my treasured guest."

Almost grimacing at the term of endearment, Goro catches himself and twists it into what he knows is a charismatic smile instead. Slipping back into the old performance still comes to him easily enough, especially considering their surroundings, but it's also starting to… pinch around the edges. Like outgrowing a well-worn pair of shoes. "Good evening," Goro answers on autopilot, quickly rifling through what he recalls of their previous interaction for relevant details, "Theo. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Theodore's face lights up, and he even blushes slightly (Goro does not roll his eyes, because he is a professional), clearly pleased that Goro not only dropped the honorific but also remembered to use the diminutive version of his name. The awkward silence that follows is blessedly brief, broken as Theodore clears his throat delicately, into a gloved hand, and starts to speak again.

"First, let me commend you on strengthening your bonds — for that is where your power lies — particularly for those that, at one point, were at risk of becoming, ah, 'reversed', if not severed entirely."

Okumura and Sakura's faces come to mind, understandably, followed by the same small voice that has started whispering 'Fool' in his ear whenever he thinks of Ren.

Empress.

Hermit.

Goro is on tentatively, and surprisingly, good terms with both of them now, but it's not exactly hard to imagine how things might have turned sour between them.

"Secondly, and although I am unable to provide you with any specific details, I wish to inform you that your window of opportunity draws near."

A handful of seconds pass — with Theodore watching him expectantly — before Goro realises that he is, apparently, going to leave it at that.

Catching the tip of his tongue between his teeth, Goro tugs at the cuffs of his sleeves, and wrestles with the urge to go hard and press for more information. Because he wants to — wants to ask what the hell 'near' means, to start. Is it tomorrow? Next week?

Approaching the issue directly seems almost guaranteed to be an exercise in futility, though — particularly when Theodore just told him that he's unable to elaborate. Restrained, Goro assumes, by some array of strange, nonsensical rules about fate and interference that would, most likely, make any line of inquiry pointless.

On the other hand, it's not as if it could end up being any more pointless than this entire exchange already has. Certainly, a clap on the back and a vague hint about what the future holds for him doesn't quite seem like it was worth the visit.

He makes a mental note to ask Ren if this level of non-communication is the Velvet Room standard.

Thinking about Ren's Velvet Room experience also brings Lavenza to mind, and more specifically, the oddly territorial behaviour she'd displayed regarding her own guest. His sample size is small, admittedly, but there seems to be a good chance that it might be related, in some way, to how Theodore appears to trip over himself every time that Goro is even marginally nice to him. It was already made clear, in the conversation he had here last night, that an attendant's appearance is usually made with the guest in mind — crafted specifically to help foster a bond between them. Would it follow then that these beings might have an inbuilt tendency (or at least a greater likelihood) to become infatuated with their guests?

And if so, can that be used to his advantage?

Naïvely, Goro had allowed himself to think that he wouldn't have to resort to this specific brand of pandering anymore (now that he's been, seemingly, forgotten by the public) but he'd be a fool not to at least try. Turning the charm up to eleven is his first thought, the way that he would if he was trying to make a group of his fans swoon so hard that they'd stop asking him annoying questions, but he also has a suspicion that might just fluster Theodore beyond any potential usefulness.

Goro decides to exploit his obvious desire to be helpful instead.

Shifting in his seat to mirror the way that Theodore is sitting (back straight, legs crossed, hands folded together primly), Goro channels everything he has into coming across as earnestly open and pleasant as possible. Wide-eyed, just the right amount of desperate, and above all, sincere. "Can you tell me anything about this opportunity? Anything at all? Even the smallest detail would be immensely helpful," he says, and then, for good measure, adds, "Please, Theo."

And — bullseye!

Blinking rapidly, lips parted and with colour high in his cheeks, Theodore appears to be genuinely stunned, and a long moment passes before he remembers himself. Clearing his throat again, he reaches up to straighten the lapels of his jacket in an obvious attempt to regain his composure.

Goro comes very close to ruining his little act entirely by grinning openly in triumph. Unfortunately, however, it seems that any celebration on his part might be slightly premature. Theodore is certainly flushed and flattered, but he also looks torn. Caught somewhere between relishing the attention and despairing because, presumably, he still isn't going to be able to give Goro anything more concrete to work with.

Despite Goro laying it on so thick that it's left him feeling his skin is crawling.

Fantastic.

There's nothing quite like debasing yourself and then realising that it was for absolutely no reason. A position that he is depressingly familiar with.

"I do apologise, truly…" Theodore murmurs, hands fidgeting in his lap as he trails off. He looks away then, gazing out over the rows of empty seats, as if he might find a loophole — some way to circumvent whatever mystical rule is preventing him from being able to just come out and say what he means — there. "All that I can say on the matter," he starts again, after a moment, yellow eyes sliding back to meet Goro's, "is that you should endeavour to be receptive. Even when your instincts might indicate otherwise."

"Receptive..." Goro repeats blankly, and through a frozen smile, because what the hell is that supposed to mean? Has he been anything other than fucking receptive in the last twenty-four hours?!

If the frustration shows on his face, Theodore doesn't seem to notice it. If anything, he just comes across as being inordinately pleased with himself. Sitting happily as he waits patiently for Goro to continue.

Deep breath.

There's no point in burning bridges, particularly when they're so new (and no matter how much he might like to), just because he didn't get what he wanted. It would be childish and short-sighted, and he's not quite so paranoid that he thinks Theodore is being unhelpful on purpose. So Goro balls up his dissatisfaction, along with the impulse to be nasty, and pushes them down — as far as they'll go — until he's confident that he can open his mouth without it all pouring out in a poisonous flood.

"Well then, Theo, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. Now, if there's nothing else…?"

"That is all, my treasured guest," Theodore says, still inexplicably proud. "Please, return to your time of rest."

There's a jolt then, a tiny zip of electricity that makes the hair on his arms stand to attention, like they would have if he just brushed against something statically charged. The strange sensation is followed by an almost physical click in his brain as something slides into place.

Hanged Man.

Goro barely has time to process the words — let alone a chance to put any real thought into why someone as sweetly dim as Theodore might be associated with such an ominous-sounding arcana — before his eyes are closing, the Velvet Room is falling away, and he's sinking backwards, downwards, tumbling through the fabric of reality, and into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Chapter Text

Goro wakes up like clockwork at his usual time of 5:30.

Well, he assumes it's 5:30, give or take a minute or two, because his watch isn't on his wrist (and even if it was, he's an idiot and forgot to charge it, so it's very, very dead), and his phone is out of reach. It still seems like a safe enough bet, though, because he hasn't slept later than that in a long time — barring illness, or other circumstances outside of his control.

Circumstances such as struggling to overcome the immediate shock of re-materialising in this reality, and every increasingly improbable thing that happened afterwards.

But that was yesterday, and, curiously enough, things are actually starting to feel somewhat normal again.

Well, as much as they can be, when he's woken up with the most beautiful, maddeningly incredible boy in his bed, that is.

And if things are to be normal — if he is to carry on as if he hasn't already technically died twice, and might yet skirt the metaphorical (or potentially literal) death that would come with facing the consequences of his crimes — then doing anything other than getting up bright and early feels strange. Wrong.

He almost expects someone (his agent, or some phantom foster parent, perhaps) to materialise beside the bed and chastise him for even thinking about it. For being lazy, or wasting precious time.

Frowning up at the ceiling, Goro tuts under his breath at his own foolishness. He knows, of course, that sleep is no more of a waste of time than any of the other things that he needs to do to remain semi-functional, such as eating, or exercising, or taking care of his skin. The fact remains — even if he ignores all of his wonderful baggage — that this is still unfamiliar territory for him. Sleep is just not a thing that he's used to having the opportunity to indulge himself in.

There has always been something that needed to be done, some appointment or other that had to be kept.

Schoolwork to catch up on.

Interviews to prep for.

Reconnaissance, and targets that needed to be taken care of.

No such responsibility looms over him now. His morning is free for the first time in years. There is absolutely nothing stopping him from simply closing his eyes and going back to sleep. Particularly when even the claustrophobic position he's woken up in is oddly comfortable — pushed up against the wall with one half of his body trapped almost entirely under the warm and reassuring weight of his still sleeping, and surprisingly heavy, boyfriend.

His boyfriend.

Ren is his boyfriend.

And if waking up at 5:30 was expected — predictable — then so is the skittery, jumpy sensation in his chest that follows that particular thought. His heart doing its damnedest to scale the inside of his ribcage, as if it were a startled insect scuttling away from the light. It's not all unpleasant though, and each fluttery jitter pops and fizzes under his skin, like champagne bubbles, even while his mouth twists and spasms its way through a whole host of gymnastic manoeuvres as it tries to settle on whether it wants to be a smile, a grimace, or some strange hybrid of the two.

It's ridiculous, and the absolute height of juvenile fucking nonsense, really. Particularly when, only a few short months ago, he'd have laughed in the face of anyone who would have dared to suggest that he'd ever feel this way. Well, not literally — he'd still had an image to maintain, after all — but privately, he'd have held the very notion in extreme contempt.

And who could blame him? How could he have believed that he'd ever allow himself to be so... vulnerable, after being so careful, for so long?

But here he is, nonetheless. Rendered completely and utterly useless by a simple confession and the offer of a puerile little title. A title that is really nothing more than a token bandied about by idiotic, maudlin teens the world over.

Yes, 'ridiculous' is certainly one word for it.

Then again, so is 'marvellous.'

Goro still doesn't know exactly how to feel, honestly, but it's becoming increasingly clear that he isn't going to be able to fall back asleep, and that means that he needs to get up out of this bed — use the bathroom, splash some water on his face, do some fucking push-ups or something — anything to burn through this queasy, flustered energy.

Before he vibrates out of his skin.

Or starts trying to peel it off.

Shimmying out from underneath another person — while also trying not to disturb them — seems like it should be an impossible task. But not when that person is Ren Amamiya, apparently, because he appears to be hibernating, or in some kind of supernatural fucking torpor.

In fact, when Goro finally manages to free himself and gets both of his feet on the floor, Ren's only reaction to the disturbance is to half-snore, half-mumble something nearly unintelligible (Goro thinks he might hear Morgana's name, but it's far too slurred for him to be sure), and then burrow his way back down under the blanket, until all that Goro can see of him is the fluffy, black crown of his head.

He shouldn't find it as tooth-achingly adorable as he does, Goro thinks, covering the stubbornly fond smile that refuses to stay off his face, as he turns on his heel and sets about coming up with a modified, Ren-friendly, version of his morning routine.

The first thing that he'd normally do, weather permitting, is grab his bike and go for a cycle.

Leaving for an hour-long bike ride now is simply out of the question, both out of consideration for his... guest, and the fact that his bike (the dual-sport model that he'd finally splurged on, after spending months using the city's rental bikes) had been left, tied to a bike rack in Station Square, back in December, and had probably been stolen (or vandalised) long ago.

Which, on the surface, is a pity. It was a very nice bike. But it had also been bought with Shido's money, technically, so the idea of its remains rusting away under a bridge somewhere (preferably in a puddle of drunkard's piss) has a certain kind of petty appeal.

Eventually, he settles for running through the exercises and stretches that he would usually do as a warm-up before bouldering, and while they aren't quite as cathartic as a good cycle, they do still help with the agitation. Slightly. Even if he does end up feeling strangely self-conscious the entire time, convinced that Ren is going to wake up any second, 'hilarious' comments about his technique at the ready.

But Ren doesn't stir, not even a little — not even after Goro brushes his teeth, gets dressed, sends Sae a text asking to meet up and talk (a text that hopefully won't give her a heart attack), and then spends ten minutes fretting about the fact that there is not a single fucking morsel of food left in this godforsaken apartment.

(Well, that's not entirely true, but Goro is sure that Ren wouldn't exactly be happy with having three sticks of gum, the collected dust from several empty chip bags, and half a bottle of flat soda for breakfast.)

Returning to the bed and staring down at the vaguely human-shaped (and still non-responsive) lump under the duvet, Goro finds himself developing a newfound, and begrudging, respect for Morgana.

"Ren," Goro tries, reaching out to jab at the lump with his index finger, in what he thinks is the general area of Ren's kidneys. Though it's hard to tell through the thick, springy layer of synthetic fibre that the duvet is stuffed with. "I'm going to have to go out and get us breakfast."

Still nothing.

Throwing his hands up in the air in exasperation, or defeat, Goro makes an undignified noise that's somewhere between a squawk and a growl. "Oh, just you wait, Amamiya — I am going to bring you back the shittiest cup of convenience store coffee."

And would you look at that! There's a little movement now! Followed by another string of barely intelligible words (that, realistically, might have actually just been more snoring), but he's done waiting for Ren to come up out of his fucking coma, and he turns away from the bed and heads towards the door.

Slipping his shoes on, he decides at the last second to wear the stupid, ugly hoodie again. Only because Ren would want him to have the extra layer of anonymity the hood provides him, of course, and not because it still smells like coffee, and curry, and Ren's terrible drugstore shampoo.

The lobby downstairs is empty — understandably, since it's still far too early for the concierge to be at the front desk — so Goro doesn't have to worry about having to come up with a truncated version of the ridiculous (but okay, yes, fun) heist from yesterday evening. Although he's not sure whether he'd have bothered, even if there had been someone in the lobby. It's not as if he's really planning to go out of his way to conceal his identity once Ren has left (and takes his concerned looks with him), because Goro is genuinely curious about this theory regarding his remaining presence in the public cognition. He wants to push a little at its limits — find out what his boundaries are — once he has the chance.

Ren probably wouldn't approve, but well... What's the saying? What he doesn't know can't hurt him?

Stepping out onto the mostly empty street, and into the brisk morning air, pulls him back out of his thoughts and reminds him of what he's actually supposed to be doing. Ren's inability to wake up might have annoyed him slightly, but Goro still doesn't want to risk being gone too long, potentially leaving Ren to wake up alone.

So he hurries on down the street, holding the hood tight around his face to fend off the worst of the wind, until he reaches the same twenty-four-hour convenience store that he and the Phantom Thieves visited yesterday. It's unpleasantly cool inside, with the air conditioner turned up high, as if someone forgot to tell the cashier that it's still March, and not the middle of June. Goro shoves his hands deep into the pockets of Ren's hoodie — there's a small loop of steel twine and some ball bearings in one, and a half-finished lockpick in the other — and pretends that he doesn't feel that foolish, indulgent smile creeping onto his face again as he makes his way over to the small baked goods section.

It would be nice to be able to get something a bit, well, nicer for breakfast, he thinks, as he picks over the paltry pastry selection, but Yon Germaine doesn't open for another hour, and he did promise Ren a truly abysmal cup of coffee, so this will have to do.

There are two croissants that look slightly less sad, and limp, than the rest, so he grabs them, and then moves on to the hot beverage machine, filling two of the flimsy takeaway cups with what has to be the muddiest-looking coffee he's ever seen.

Perfect.

Goro hardly even cares that he's also going to have to suffer through drinking it.

Mediocre breakfast in hand, he heads up the aisle and towards the register, stopping and lingering a few feet away while another customer is served.

The cashier is an older woman (late forties, maybe, or early fifties) and Goro realises that he recognises her. More importantly, she should also recognise him. Having actually asked him for an autograph (for her daughter, she'd said, but Goro hadn't bought it — she was too flustered for it to have been for someone else), and then essentially held his groceries hostage until he'd acquiesced and scribbled his name down on a piece of receipt paper for her.

It's the perfect opportunity, really, to test how much the public remembers him, and, he reasons, it's not as if he has any other options when there's no one else working the registers.

He supposes that he could just abandon his things, turn around, and leave, but that seems like a supremely ridiculous thing to do when nowhere else is open yet.

And he's sure that nothing of note will actually happen anyway.

Probably.

Trying not to think too hard about how Ren would react, he shrugs his way out of the hood he's still wearing (not an easy feat with both hands full, and he does actually come quite close to losing one of the dreadful coffees to gravity in the process. Only managing to save it at the last second), and makes his way to the register.

Hopefully his hair doesn't look too terrible.

"Good morning," she says, looking up and smiling as he sets his things down on the counter. Her tone and expression are friendly, polite, closed — standard customer service stuff — but something in her eyes flickers when he matches her smile with one of his signature ones.

He braces himself for the recognition.

The barrage of questions.

But they don't come.

Tension hangs in the air between them instead, heavy and thick, while she rings up his items, and steals furtive (and clearly confused) glances at him the entire time.

Goro is so distracted that he uses the credit card in his wallet without thinking, only remembering that it might well have been cancelled while he swipes it. The payment goes through without issue though (just how many of his asshole father's assets have the authorities missed?), and he's almost convinced himself that things aren't going to go any further than this strange awkwardness, when the cashier speaks up.

"I'm sorry," she starts, "I know that this is a strange thing to ask… But, um, do I know you from somewhere?"

One thing is certain: this is entirely different from Maruki's reality, where he was never famous to begin with — where people just never knew him. This isn't just reverting to anonymity, it's being forgotten... and exactly what he imagines it must be like to be washed up. Nothing more than a half-remembered has-been, long past their expiration date.

It's strange.

He isn't quite sure if he's relieved or disappointed.

"No, sorry, I don't think so," he responds, the stupid, vapid smile still plastered across his face.

He wonders if she still has that autographed scrap of paper somewhere at home. In a drawer perhaps, or sandwiched between the pages of a book for safekeeping. Is his name still on it? Or is it blank now? Wiped clean. His scratchy little signature erased from existence.

Like he almost was.

She blinks up at him, once, twice, like her brain needs a moment to process what he said, before she defaults back to what must be her standard Customer Service expression. "Ah, well, I'm sorry for bothering you."

He offers her some kind of platitude in return, mostly on reflex, then gathers his things and leaves, maybe slightly faster (and slightly shakier) than he usually would.

That strange feeling — like he might just disappear any second now — follows him out of the store, and up the street. It still hangs over him, like a cloud (or a bad omen), in the elevator and only eases off as he lets himself back into the apartment and is greeted by the sight of a groggy, but finally awake, Ren shuffling out of the bathroom to meet him at the door.

Yawning, Ren rubs at his eyes with the heel of his hand. "I don't even get up this early on school mornings."

"I got us breakfast," Goro says, holding out one of the cups. The last of his dread bleeds away when he sees the comical look of suspicion on Ren's face as he accepts it.

"Thanks…" Ren mutters, eyeing the cup warily and trying to sniff at the contents surreptitiously before he takes a tentative sip.

Ren can be hard to read for some people, but the way that his eyes widen, and how the bridge of his nose crinkles, speak loud and clear to Goro. He might as well have gagged and spat the mouthful of coffee back into the cup.

Biting the inside of his cheek so that he doesn't laugh, Goro asks, "Good?"

"Delicious," Ren answers without missing a beat, and takes another deliberate sip. The reaction is less obvious this time. Goro is secretly impressed. "I'll have to get the name of the blend to pass on to Sojiro."

There's a beat before they both start laughing. It really is the best feeling, but god, Goro hates his actual laugh. Hates the grating, mad sound of it. But he can't keep trotting out that fake, tinkly thing anymore either, can he? And Ren certainly doesn't seem to mind, Goro thinks, as they clumsily step into each other's space — holding the hot cups out at an odd angle — and embrace. The burnt smell of bad coffee on Ren's breath is surprisingly pleasant, as he tilts his head to press a wet, but still chaste, kiss against Goro's lips.

"Morning," Ren says softly, voice still warm with amusement, along with a clear affection that Goro is slowly finding it easier and easier to accept.

"Good morning, Ren," Goro whispers back, and he's weighing the pros and cons of abandoning their subpar breakfast for something else far more enjoyable, when his phone comes to life in his pocket — shattering the moment with its shrill, stock message tone.

They hastily pull apart, Goro offloading his cup of coffee and the croissants into Ren's arms, as he pulls the offending device free and peers at the screen.

"It's Sae-san," Goro says, turning the phone towards Ren, so he can see the notification. "I sent her a text this morning — while you were still comatose — requesting a meeting."

"Oh, right..." Ren sounds like he isn't sure how to respond. "I, uh, hope that Makoto remembered to give her the heads-up."

Goro chews his lip and hums in agreement as he unlocks his screen and opens his messaging app.

-Sae Niijima-
20/03/2017
6:43 a.m.

Sae: Akechi-kun, I can't even begin to put into words how glad I was to hear that you're alright.

Ah, so she had been told in advance. Goro is genuinely relieved, and also completely caught off guard again by how much she seems to care.

Sae: I might need to modify my schedule to fit you in, but I'm more than happy to set up a meeting today if that's what you need.
Sae: Just name your time.

Goro looks up. Ren is leaning against the edge of the kitchen counter, and he gives Goro a questioning raised-eyebrow look as he pops a piece of croissant into his mouth.

"When does your train leave, Ren?"

Ren blinks and frowns, as if Goro bringing it up is making it more real, and swallows his mouthful of pastry. "Two-thirty."

Goro types a quick 'Three o'clock if possible, Sae-san. Thank you.' and sends it. He almost thanks her for her concern as well, but decides against it at the last second, worried that — given their history — it might come across as sarcastic instead of sincere.

Better to do it in person.

"Well, now that's taken care of…" Goro starts, slipping his phone back into the pocket of his borrowed jeans and joining Ren in the kitchen-proper. "How about we finish our tragic breakfast, and then go take that shower?"

Ren instantly perks up at the suggestion. "Together?"

"Together."

Chapter Text

Ren isn't sure exactly what time it is when he realises that Goro isn't in bed with him anymore, but the mattress beside him is still warm, and his internal clock tells him enough to know that it's still way too early. Probably even by Morgana's standards.

It's also kind of cold, so he pulls the duvet up over his head, snuggles back down into the pillow, and drifts a little. Waiting to hear the toilet flush, or the gentle whoosh of a tap running, or even just the soft sound of Goro's bare feet padding across the floor.

Minutes pass (or hours. It's hard to tell), but Goro doesn't come back to bed. Ren frowns into the slightly scratchy surface of the bare pillow.

Weird.

Unless it's not? He has no idea what Goro's morning routine looks like, after all. Other than, he supposes, being provided with the photographic evidence of how he used to go cycling pretty much every day (thank you, Futaba). But also, honestly? It's kind of hard to put any real thought into it when he's still mostly asleep.

So, okay, maybe being up this early is totally normal for Goro, and Ren is getting ready to leave it at that — to get comfy again and go back to sleep properly — when he hears something that definitely qualifies as weird. There's this quiet… huffing sound, soft little rhythmic exhales spaced a couple of seconds apart, coming from somewhere outside his pillowy fortress.

It's obviously Goro — both because Ren has had plenty of first-hand experience with what he sounds like when he's breathing kind of heavily in the last seventy-two hours, and because he doubts that someone broke into the apartment just to pant like a weirdo over the other side of the room — but he can't figure out why exactly Goro might be making that noise right now either.

Especially this early in the morning.

Ren lifts the edge of the blanket slightly, just enough to have room to peek out and try and find out what's going on. It's gloomy, but not quite dark in the apartment, and it only takes Ren a second to spot his (clearly insane) boyfriend across the room. Over on the floor near the kotatsu.

Doing sit-ups.

In nothing but his underwear.

It's with a kind of sleepy disbelief, and through bleary and slightly unfocused eyes, that Ren watches the way the muscles in Goro's bare stomach flex attractively with each rep.

He's suddenly not so sure that he ever actually woke up at all.

Ren's eyes close.

He forces them back open.

Even the hopeful semi he's suddenly jabbing the duvet with isn't quite enough to shake the cobwebs in his head.

Man, what time is it?

Reaching for his phone to check would be too dangerous, though. It's just plugged in to charge on the floor beside the bed, but even that's too far away. What if Goro notices that he's (kind of) awake and can't be convinced to come back to bed? What if he makes him get up? Or worse, what if he wants Ren to join him in his freakishly early morning workout?

Yeah, going for the phone is too risky. Ren decides to look around the room for some kind of clue about what time it is instead.

The apartment is only dimly lit, which means the light above him must be off — even though Ren is pretty sure they forgot to turn it off last night — and the only reason he's actually able to see what Goro is doing at all is because the door to the little bathroom is wide open and the light is on in there.

Blinking slowly, deliberately, and almost losing the battle with sleep again, Ren squints over at the window. The blinds are closed, but there's a tiny sliver of light just visible between two of the slats near the bottom, where the corner of one is bent a little out of shape. It's so warm and orange that Ren assumes, for a second, that it must be the sunrise — which would have been bad enough — but then it actually flickers, and he almost groans out loud.

It's the streetlight outside Goro's window.

The sun isn't even up yet!

It's so ridiculous that Ren thinks that he's going to have to break cover and say something anyway (maybe about how being up, and especially exercising, this early is probably illegal, and how if it isn't, then it should be), but he must close his eyes again without meaning to, because it's like time skips, and he's suddenly lying on his opposite side.

Goro is standing above him now, talking — or complaining, actually, by the sounds of things — and Ren thinks he might have just said something about coffee.

Shitty coffee.

Ren tries to protest, he really does, but he's still too slow and groggy, and his well-thought-out argument about how Goro should come back to bed and wait until a more reasonable hour (so they can go get some decent coffee together), ends up sounding more like something you'd hear in a low-budget zombie movie.

Unmoved by his slurred pleas, Goro leaves without looking back.

Ren assumes.

Because he's still hiding under the covers.

Even after hearing the door close and the little click of the key turning in the lock, Ren is still struggling to wake up, so he bites the bullet, kicks the duvet off altogether (removing the temptation to snuggle back down and drift off again) and pushes himself up into a sitting position. It still probably takes another five minutes before he actually reaches the point where he can keep his eyes open for more than a couple of seconds at a time, but progress is progress, right?

And hey, the sun is up now!

That's something at least.

He stretches his arms above his head, yawns so wide that his jaw creaks in protest, and frowns at the closed front door. Now that he's semi-awake, he's starting to feel a little guilty for staying in bed while Goro has been up and about for who-knows-how-long.

They should be making the most of the time they have left, right?

But then he grabs his phone, unplugs it, and almost drops it again out of sheer disbelief when he sees the bright little row of numbers on his lock-screen.

6:22 a.m.

Oh, c'mon! That is criminal.

Ren wouldn't consider himself to be a spiteful person — and he's not actually going to do it — but he thinks really hard about grabbing the duvet back up off the floor so that he can hold his own little sleepy protest. Shaking his head instead, he unlocks his phone, and falls into his own usual drowsy morning routine: aimless browsing.

There are no new notifications in the Phantom Thieves group chat, which is weird, and something that might actually worry him on a normal morning. If he wasn't so sure that they were all too busy in their own chat last night, that is, conspiring amongst themselves about whatever the other part of his surprise is. There is a private message from Ann, though. Just a picture of her leaning over a sleeping Morgana, flashing the peace sign and sticking her tongue out, cheekily making fun of the little splash of pink against white fur where Morgana is doing the same thing in his sleep.

Ren smiles, huffing a fond little laugh to himself as he closes the chat window. Still moving on sleepy autopilot, he finds himself opening the news app to scan the headlines for targets.

Even though the Meta-nav is long gone from his home screen.

He hasn't been able to stop himself from looking each morning anyway.

But just like every other day, nothing interesting jumps out at him as he scrolls past sports pieces, articles about the political reshuffle after what happened with Shido, and a bunch of boring celebrity gossip.

Everything is normal.

Everyone seems safe and (mostly) happy.

Is it messed up that he's kind of disappointed?

It's not that he wants anyone to be in such a bad way that they need help, not really anyways… It just doesn't feel like he's done.

With the Metaverse. Or Tokyo.

Ren just wants there to be a reason for the Velvet Room to call on him again.

He wants a reason to not have to get on that train today.

Scrubbing his hand across his face and sighing deeply, Ren closes the app and tries to work out how long Goro's been gone… Fifteen minutes? Maybe? It's stupid early, and most places would still be closed, so he's most likely at the twenty-four-hour convenience store they went to yesterday (Ren tries not to think too hard about the ancient, crusty-looking coffee machine he remembers seeing there), and that's just down the street. So, Ren figures that he should probably do something to make himself a bit more presentable. Namely, pulling his clothes on, heading into the bathroom to take a leak, and seeing if he can do something about the way his mouth feels like something died in it while he's in there.

Goro's bathroom (just like the rest of his apartment) is small, compact, and a weird mixture of Japanese and Western features. There's no tub in sight, only a narrow shower stall with three tiled walls and a sliding glass door. The toilet and sink are squashed up right beside it, kind of like the bathrooms from the hotel they stayed at in Hawaii… just more cramped, while also still managing to be a whole lot fancier. All four walls and the floor are covered in shiny and expensive-looking black tile, and even though it had all been a bit dusty yesterday (not being lived in for three months will do that to a place, Ren supposes), it was still clear that Goro actually puts some effort into keeping this room clean and tidy. Unlike his kitchen.

There's a shelf recessed into the wall beside the sink, and Ren can still remember — before they'd packed it all away — the row after row of products that had been lined up in the little nook yesterday, almost as obsessively organised as Goro's sock drawer.

Which is really saying something.

Not that it's empty now, of course. Goro must have taken pretty much all of his 'essentials' back out of his overnight bag last night (while Ren had still been napping at the kotatsu), and that means that more than half of the stuff that was there yesterday has found its way home again. At least ten different bottles and tubs are arranged neatly, from tallest to shortest, flush against the tile at the back of the shelf.

Ren hasn't got a clue about what's in half of them, because skincare isn't really his thing, and most of the labels are in English and Korean, but he finds himself trying to guess anyway. There's a white bottle that's definitely lotion, and a tub of something with an English label that he thinks reads 'body butter', but he's not sure. Then there's at least another two types of moisturiser (just for his face?), a tiny little pot of stuff that's supposed to be used on your eyes (for what, Ren doesn't know), and then a couple of smaller, glass bottles filled with brightly coloured liquid that have funny little droppers built into their lids.

(And that's not even going into the fact that there are even more toiletries on the matching shelf in the shower.)

Shaking his head about just how ridiculous his boyfriend is, Ren flips the toilet seat up and takes care of his full bladder, washes his hands, and then sets about trying to find something to de-gross his mouth.

There aren't any spare toothbrushes in the bathroom (just Goro's fancy, electric one, sitting pretty in its charger by the sink. Lights pulsing up its sides like it's getting ready to rocket up into space), but there's mouthwash, and toothpaste, at least, and those are both things he can work with.

Five minutes later, Ren has jabbed his gums with his index finger so many times that he's a little worried that they might be bruised, but his teeth are as brushed as they're going to get without an actual, well, brush, and all he can really do now is hope that the mouthwash makes up for any spots he missed.

Once he's done, he washes his hands again, gives his pits a quick sniff (definitely not the freshest he's ever been but not the grossest either), throws some water on his face to try and wake himself up a bit more (it doesn't really work), and grabs one of the fluffy towels from the rack beside the shower to dry off.

Of course, out of all the things in the bathroom, the shower is what Ren is most interested in, and he catches himself staring longingly at the gleaming metal showerhead set into the wall.

Could anyone really blame him, though? When, not including the washing facilities in the juvenile detention centre (because the less he thinks about that the better), he's had a full year of having no real option other than the bathhouse across the street from Leblanc. Which has been fine mostly, but he'd be lying if he said that it wasn't the absolute worst in the winter. Having to dash across the street after he was done, in the freezing cold (and sometimes, the snow), with damp hair, and Morgana yowling in his ear like he needed to be told to go faster.

So yeah, he's looking forward to having a real shower, maybe even being allowed to dry off properly afterwards, and then, the cherry on top: while it'll probably be a tight squeeze, there's still definitely enough room for two people to stand together in the stall.

And as if on cue, he hears Goro's key slide into the lock.

Ren's heart does that giddy little jump in his chest that it seems to do now whenever Goro's near, and he gives himself another quick once-over in the mirror (he still looks half asleep, but whose fault is that?) before he heads back out to meet Goro at the door.

And what a sight he is — crooked smile on his face, colour high in his cheeks from the morning chill, and his still-unstyled hair turned into a fluffy, painfully cute mess by the wind.

He's also still wearing Ren's hoodie.

Ren does love the dorky, stuffy way that he normally dresses, but right now, Goro looks just like any other normal kid. Relaxed and happy.

It suits him.

It's almost enough to distract Ren from the sly glint in his eye as he moves the small plastic bag he's carrying into the crook of his elbow (it looks like he also bought some pastries. Ren hopes they taste better than the coffee smells) so he can use his now-free hand to pull one of the ominously steaming cups out of the cardboard holder and offer it to Ren.

Bluffing his way through the nasty coffee and then breaking down laughing about it feels like such an amazingly domestic way to start his morning. Ren bundles the memory away somewhere safe as they fall into each other's arms. It'll help him get through his last year in Kanbara until he can come back to Tokyo for good, and they can have more mornings like this.

Well, with better coffee, hopefully.

Then their little moment is interrupted by Goro's phone going off. It's Makoto's sister, and Ren knows that he shouldn't dwell on it too much — knows it's out of his hands — but he can't help but think about the fact that, even though they know that any murder charges are off the table, there's still probably a tonne of red tape that Goro's going to have to work through with her.

Trying not to frown, and wishing he'd thought to put his glasses on, Ren leans back against the kitchen counter, hoping that his bangs do a good enough job of hiding how anxious he's feeling instead. Absent-mindedly tearing a piece off his croissant, he shoves it into his mouth, and tries to unpick and reason through the little ball of worry coiled in the pit of his stomach.

Sae Niijima is supposed to be very good at her job (being a defence attorney is probably pretty similar to being a prosecutor, right?) and Ren knows that she'll do her best for Goro, just like she did for him… but he also knows that she's working within a corrupt system and that her best might not be enough.

Just like it wasn't for him.

Crap.

Well, that didn't work.

Okay, so he can't really rationalise it away right now, not when there's still so much stuff up in the air anyway, and that leaves him with really only one other option.

He's just going to ignore it.

No big deal, right?

Being able to set aside big-ticket, stressful things so that he can focus on the now is something that Ren had to get very good at, very fast, once he came to Tokyo and stumbled into the Metaverse. It was the only way he'd been able to stay on top of his schoolwork and other responsibilities while a Palace deadline was hanging over him, after all.

So, when Goro suggests that they finish up their breakfast and then go take a shower (together!), Ren doesn't even have to try all that hard to let his unpleasant thoughts be swept away by the much more attractive promise of some bubbly fun.

He does what any sane man in his position would do, really, and just starts inhaling the rest of his croissant and his gross coffee so fast that he hardly even tastes them.

"A little overeager, are we?" Goro teases, using one hand to try and hide that he's doing it through a mouthful of his own breakfast.

There's a warm feeling in Ren's chest that has nothing to do with guzzling down the nasty coffee at breakneck speed — a toasty, fuzzy thing, like there's a mini Morgana snuggled up to his heart and purring up a storm. The simple comfort and happiness that comes with being able to really be themselves around each other without also having to dance around a bunch of other background stuff.

To just stand here, in Goro's kitchen, and watch him stuff his face while making fun of Ren for doing exactly the same thing.

No second-guessing.

No mental games.

Just the two of them, and how important they are to each other.

Goro knocks back the last of his coffee with an inelegant grimace and notices Ren watching. "Hm?"

Shrugging, Ren peers back at him over the rim of his own battered cardboard cup. It's pretty much empty, but he's actually using it to hide the start of the grin on his face, so that doesn't really matter. "Just thinking about how much I love you."

And it's true — couldn't be more true — but really, Ren said it almost entirely for the reaction. For the way that Goro looks genuinely dumbstruck, eyebrows disappearing behind the curtain of his bangs. His expression shocked into something soft, open and completely unguarded for a second, before he catches himself.

"Yes, well," Goro says, clearing his throat a little awkwardly but maintaining steady, intense eye contact. Like he thinks he should be trying to stare Ren down to show how serious he is, or something. It's pretty funny. Also adorable. "I love you too, Ren."

Grinning like a doofus, and not caring even a little, Ren plucks Goro's empty cup out of his hand, nests it within his own and sets them both aside onto the countertop next to them. Then, with that out of the way, he leans in to steal a kiss.

Goro's lips part for him with a pretty little sigh that goes straight to Ren's dick. It's nearly enough to make him forget entirely about what he was going to suggest they do next.

Nearly.

"Remember that time we went to the bathhouse together?" Ren asks softly as they pull apart. Goro blinks a couple of times, thrown by the sudden shift for a second, but then nods for Ren to continue. "When we were done in the bath, you challenged me to see which one of us could get dressed the fastest—"

"A competition that I won—"

"Yeah," Ren laughs, and boops Goro's nose with his own, making it crinkle up in a cute little scrunch. "And I'm saying that we should have a rematch. See who can get undressed the fastest this time."

Goro blinks again, laughs, and then makes an effort to put on his serious face. Humming and taking a step backwards, with one hand on his hip and the other curled into a loose fist at his chin, he looks Ren up and down with a composed consideration that might have been believable if it wasn't for the pink blush that's spread across his cheeks.

(And the tent he's clearly already starting to pitch in his pants.)

"I'm wearing more layers than you are, Ren. You have me at a disadvantage."

"What? You're going to back down, just like that?" Ren teases, knowing full well that there's no way that's going to happen.

"Oh no, of course not," Goro tuts, mouth curling into a smug little smirk, "I just wanted to ensure that you're acutely aware of your head start before I proceed to trounce you. Soundly."

Laughing under his breath, Ren reaches down to grasp the buckle of his belt. Goro's eyes follow the movement like they're magnetised. "On three?"

…

It's dumb. It's messy. They both trip over themselves (and each other) more than once.

And Ren really shouldn't be surprised, but there even ends up being a little foul play involved. When he was struggling with getting his ankle out of the leg of his jeans, Goro took the opportunity to bump into him so hard that he nearly went sprawling, and then followed it up with a too-innocent smile and an assurance that he'd lost his own balance and was just trying to steady himself.

Even with — or okay, maybe even because of — the sabotage, Ren's laughing so hard his ribs hurt, and his eyes are streaming.

"Looks like it's my win again, Ren," Goro chuckles breathlessly, throwing his underwear unceremoniously over his shoulder as they stumble into the bathroom. The black bundle of cloth sails through the air to land somewhere in the haphazard trail of clothes they left behind them.

(Ren's kind of proud that he distracted Goro enough that he didn't even stop to fold any of them.)

He's just seconds behind Goro, and that's only because he was nearly shoved off his feet earlier, but he doesn't really mind losing. Not when his boyfriend is practically glowing in the wake of his 'victory,' grinning and flushed, and beautiful.

And yeah, it's also kind of difficult to hold a grudge when they're both naked, and hard, and crammed into a tiny room together.

Ren has a moment where he thinks about just pinning Goro up against the wall and forgetting all about the shower (for now), but he's also very aware of how long it's been since he actually had one. Sure, he passed that quick sniff test earlier, and he can usually get away with going a few days between baths, but he also doesn't normally have to worry about anyone getting as close to him as Goro has been.

(Other than Morgana and Ryuji, but they don't really count.)

There's also been a lot of sweaty, uh, exercise over the last couple of days too… He's probably not far off starting to smell pretty ripe, is what he's getting at.

So yeah, he'd like to get clean before they get dirty.

Trying not to laugh at his own joke (especially since he didn't say it out loud), Ren bows a little at the waist and gestures with one hand towards the shower. "After you."

Goro looks like he's going to say something — like there's a sarcastic response right on the tip of his tongue — but then their eyes meet, and there's this weird, déjà vu moment. Ren wonders if they're both thinking about when he'd done almost exactly the same thing while he was showing Goro the way out of the Velvet Room the other night.

And Ren knows that they must be on the same page, when Goro reaches out to him, cups his face in warm hands, and kisses him tenderly, lovingly — tongue sliding into his mouth in a deep drag that makes Ren's chest tight even as it makes his dick ache. When they pull apart again, Goro is flushed and panting, smiling at him with a kind of affectionate disbelief as he takes Ren by the hand and leads him into the shower.

Once they're both actually in the stall and the glass door is pulled closed behind them, Ren realises that it's an even tighter squeeze than he thought it would be earlier. Not that that's a bad thing, of course. Not with the way his dick is pressed right up against Goro's tail bone, little jolts of pleasure zipping up his spine when he's jostled as Goro reaches up to change the angle of the showerhead.

"You're insatiable," Goro chuckles breathlessly. Pushing back against him and making Ren feel like his brain is turning to mush already.

Hands dropping to Goro's hips of their own accord, Ren pulls him even closer. "Like you're — ah — any better."

But that's when Goro turns the handle and the water starts, and god, it sounds over the top, but it's like a waterfall from some tropical (or maybe mythical) country. The spray of water is just the right temperature, and it beats down on them with the perfect amount of pressure. It's enough to actually remind Ren he's supposed to be taking care of the personal hygiene part of having a shower before they start grinding on each other.

"Want me to wash your back?"

"Oh?" Goro starts a little, surprised, and bumps distractingly back up against Ren's dick again. Biting his lip, Ren forces himself to focus on how Goro's ears have gone a really cute shade of pink instead. "Yes. Please."

Goro reaches up to grab his loofah off its little suction cup hook and squeezes a generous amount of body wash onto it. Ren watches the water run down Goro's back as he does it. Little rivulets following the line of his spine, his shoulder blades, slipping down the muscles of his back before going lower…

Ren wants to trace their path with his tongue.

"Ren?"

Oh, Goro was saying something. Whoops. "Hmm?"

"We'll need to trade places, surely?"

It takes a second for Ren's brain to catch up, but once it does, he realises that what Goro's saying makes sense. If Ren's going to be washing his back, and Goro also happens to be standing directly under the water, any soap he uses will just be washed off straight away. Which, yeah, would be fine if he was just giving himself a quick scrub… but it kind of defeats the purpose of doing it for someone else.

"Oh, right…"

They have to do an awkward little waddle-shuffle to get into the right position, and it's funny enough that it clears some of the horny fog that's clouding his head. When Goro presses the bubbly loofah into his palm, Ren's back on task.

He squishes it in his hands a couple of times to get a lather going, and wow, the body wash that Goro uses smells amazing. Rich and masculine, but with this delicate, floral scent underneath, and the texture is just as good. Indulgent, creamy, sensual…

All the stuff that the ads for these things say, but are never actually true.

(Although maybe there's something to doing more than just grabbing the first thing that costs less than three hundred yen off the shelf in Yongen-Jaya's little convenience store.)

Working the loofah over Goro's back in firm, smooth movements, Ren occasionally switches in his free hand to show off some more of the massage skills he'd already used on Goro in the attic yesterday morning. They seem to go down just as well now as they did then. Goro sighs deeply, leaning forward to brace his forearms against the tiled wall in front of him, like he'd be having a hard time staying on his feet otherwise.

Staying focused during this massage is a little trickier, though. They'd still had a couple of layers of clothing between them yesterday, and a few millimetres of fabric makes all the difference when your dick is constantly bumping up against someone's ass.

The soap isn't helping either — or more, it's helping too much — dripping down Goro's back as he works and removing any of the drag there might have been whenever Ren momentarily forgets that he's actually supposed to be washing and massaging his boyfriend, instead of just grinding on him. It is kind of fun (and also kind of makes Ren feel like some of the steam in the shower must be coming out of his ears), trying to figure if there's a difference between the little moans and gasps that Goro makes when he eases a knot out of a muscle in his back and the ones he makes when Ren's dick slides between his ass cheeks and skates over his hole.

Man, he really wishes that he knew a bit more about this kind of stuff right now, because it feels like it would be so easy for Goro to arch his back, change the angle of his hips and let Ren sink right in — just thinking about it is enough to make Ren's nostrils flare and have his vision go dark around the edges — but he doesn't know if it actually would be, and he definitely knows that he doesn't want to hurt Goro.

(He also has a gut feeling that Goro might not actually tell him if it did hurt anyway.)

Lube exists for a reason, right?

So he behaves himself mostly, taking satisfaction in the blissed-out look on Goro's face while he does his thing instead.

"Your back's done, I think…" Ren says eventually, after giving it one more soapy swipe for good measure, and only just resists the urge to slap Goro's ass like he would the bonnet of a freshly washed car. "Should we move onto your, uh, front?" Ren hears himself add, and cracks up laughing at the same time that Goro does. "What? Too subtle?"

"Very much so, yes," Goro laughs, already starting to turn around. Ren does his best to make room, but it's not exactly easy when things are so cramped. "I'm not sure how I'll ever crack your code, in fact."

"I should just show you what I mean, huh?"

"Hmm, you could — but doesn't it seem inefficient…" They're already on top of each other, but Goro leans in even closer, until their noses are almost touching. He catches Ren's wrist in his hand, twisting it slightly, so he can drag the bubbly loofah between them. Covering both of their chests in the sweet-smelling suds. "To only wash one person at a time?"

Despite the steam, Ren's mouth has gone dry. "Uh, well, if it's in the name of efficiency…"

Goro chuckles, low and dark, as the slightly rough surface of the loofah tickles and scratches across Ren's chest again. He has to suppress a shiver as the thick lather does exactly what it was doing on Goro's back — dribbling down, and down, pooling a little in his belly button before sliding over his achingly hard dick. A ghost of sensation that makes Ren's hips twitch forward in search of some actual friction. He's kind of expecting Goro to pull back, to tease and keep the distance between them like he had last night — nasty (hot) smirk on his face as he does it — but he meets him instead, the soap and water making the grind smooth as their dicks slide up against each other. Ren groans and feels his brain stutter and skip like one of the old CDs his parents used to play in the car when he was a kid.

Vaguely, Ren thinks about how Goro doesn't seem to be quite as committed as he was to the washing part of things, just intermittently squeezing the loofah in Ren's hand to keep things slippery between them. Maybe Ren should even be teasing him for it (he knows that Goro would be if their positions were flipped), but it's hard to complain when even just rutting up against each other like this feels so good.

Then Goro wraps his free hand around both of their dicks at the same time, and the only reason that Ren doesn't just come on the spot right then and there is because, over the last couple of days, he's already come, uh… he's not even sure how many times. A lot anyway, and it's not like he's going to try and figure it out now. Not when Goro is squeezing them together, his fist pumping up and down in a slow, firm glide that has them both panting and gasping into the half-inch of space between them.

And wow, that feels so different, and so much better than a normal handjob — even one from Goro — and not just because of the soap. It's having Goro pressed up against him like this, feeling how hard he is, seeing just how affected he is, while Ren's experiencing it all too.

Honestly, he didn't think it could feel like this without one of them being inside the other, but holy shit, was he wrong, and it only gets more intense when Ren tries thrusting shallowly to match the rhythm of Goro's fist, fucking up into the slick, tight tunnel of his fingers and right up against his dick.

"Hah — that feels so good, Goro," Ren pants, and Goro drags his eyes up to meet his; they're hazy and slightly unfocused. "You're so good — so perfect—"

And Goro, somehow, flushes even more at the praise, even as his eyebrows come together and his mouth twists a little, turning down at the corners. Ren thinks for a second that he's actually going to argue with him, but then the frown softens, and a small moan escapes on a shaky exhale. "Tell me — ah! Tell me you love me, Ren — please."

Ren's chest burns, and he lets the loofah fall to the floor so that he can lace their fingers together properly instead. "I love you, Goro — I love you-" Goro's literally trembling now, the up and down movement of his fist turning jerky and erratic, and Ren hurries to bring his free hand down to join it, helping to keep things steady. "More than anything."

"Ren — o-oh! Fu-uck—!" Goro's expression twists into something anguished and even more beautiful, and then he's coming, cursing and grunting the whole time as he quakes and shudders against Ren.

Waiting a couple of seconds (just until Goro's only breathing heavily instead of gasping for air), Ren readjusts his grip, hoping to finish himself off. He's caught off guard by Goro pushing his hand away entirely.

"Don't even think about it."

Ren only manages to get out a confused 'bwuh?' sound before Goro wraps strong fingers back around his dick. There's a dangerous smile on his face that's so sharp it makes Ren break out in goosebumps and has his blood singing with anxious anticipation. It's disorienting, and the exact opposite of how things were just a few seconds ago, as Goro sets a punishing pace, pumping him so hard and fast that spots bloom behind Ren's eyelids. Swaying unsteadily on his feet, his hands fly out to clutch at Goro's upper arms, fingers digging into the meat of his biceps as he hangs on for dear life.

Ren's close — was already close — like probably-would-have-been-done-in-two-more-strokes-anyway kind of close — but then Goro sinks his teeth into the flesh where his neck joins his shoulder, right on top of where he'd left all the other bite marks on Saturday night, and Ren loses it. Eyes rolling back in his head, toes curling against the tile, as he comes undone with a ragged, broken cry that feels like it's punched out of his lungs.

And Goro works him through it, more gently now — still biting and suckling at his neck — until Ren's oversensitive and shaking, and pretty sure that he'd fall over if he wasn't still clinging onto Goro like his life depends on it.

"I love you too," Goro breathes against his skin, kissing and licking his way from Ren's poor, tender shoulder, up along the side of his neck — his jaw — until they sink into a deep, sloppy kiss.

They stay like that for a while, making out lazily as the water beats down on them (it's lost a little of its heat now, but that's actually kind of nice after getting so worked up), but eventually, they pull apart, and Ren manages to find his voice again.

"Uh, we should probably actually shower now, huh?"

"Probably," Goro agrees, chuckling and running his fingers backwards through his wet hair, sweeping it up and out of his face.

Ren reaches out to trace the sharp line of one of Goro's cheekbones with his thumb. "You should wear your hair back more often. It suits you."

Quirking an eyebrow at him, Goro snorts. "Seriously? This is coming from you?"

"Yeah, okay, fair point."

"Now…" Goro turns away, just enough so that he can peruse the row of bottles on the shelf beside them. "I'm fairly certain we don't have the same hair type… or skin type—"

"There are skin types?" Ren interrupts. Goro ignores him.

"But I'm sure that what I have here will still be better than that drugstore two-in-one trash you usually use."

Ren shrugs. "It does the job."

"Hmm…" Goro sends a long, sceptical and very judgemental look in the general direction of Ren's hair. "Does it?"

"I think you're just jealous that I don't have to work to look this good," Ren grins, winks, and then yelps when Goro tweaks his nipple.

Ouch.

Still giving him a look that could make grass wither, Goro makes an impatient twirly motion with the hand that isn't holding the fancy-looking, black and gold shampoo bottle. "Turn around and tip your head back. I don't want to get any in your eyes."

Maybe Ren earned himself some brownie points earlier, with the massage/back washing combo, because Goro is gentle with him — careful with him — as he washes and conditions his hair, and again, when he retrieves the loofah to return the favour and wash Ren's back. Even when they're both clean, and they get out of the shower to dry off, Goro is quick to step in and help towel dry his hair.

It's… nice.

Ren's not really used to other people taking care of him.

The only time that Goro's sharp edges resurface to poke through the softness is when he's rubbing lotion into Ren's skin, near his collarbone, and pauses to drag a firm and possessive thumb across the line of bites on his shoulder. Whispering a smug 'I do hope you have more than one turtleneck in your wardrobe, Ren,' into his ear, and Ren wonders out loud about whether he's actually dating a vampire.

Because Goro already dresses like someone who's been around way longer than eighteen years, anyway, right?

(It's an observation that isn't appreciated, for some reason.)

Once they're dressed (it feels kind of weird to see Goro back in his uniform again), and after they've done one more sweep to make sure that everything really is packed away, there isn't any real reason left for them to stay in the apartment (even if Ren really would like to). Especially if they want to get out of here before the old man starts working the desk downstairs again.

"Ready?" Goro asks, looking up from where he has the train schedule open on his phone.

"Yeah, let's go."

Nodding, Goro hoists his overnight bag onto his shoulder, and walks out into the hallway without looking back. Ren hangs on for a second, though, pausing in the doorway to give the place one last fond look, before he closes the door behind them.

The first goodbye of many.

Chapter Text

To get back to Yongen-Jaya from Honmachi, they have to take two trains. The first one is way too noisy and crowded, full of people travelling to visit family for the spring equinox, but the second train journey is a little quieter and, surprisingly, nice.

It's still busy enough, sure, and they have to stand again, but they're not crammed into the train car like they were the first time around, and that there's still a bit of a crowd really just leaves them with an easy way to hold hands without anyone else noticing.

Ren isn't actually sure about how accepting people are in Tokyo when it comes to PDA between two guys (except in Shinjuku, maybe), but he knows that back home they'd be on the receiving end of some nasty looks at the very least. Not that he thinks that they couldn't handle it if things went south, of course, but it's still something he'd like to avoid if he can.

Though, he wonders, if something did happen, would his folks let him stay in Tokyo if he ended up on probation again…? But then the line of tall buildings around the train breaks as they rush past, and Ren gets distracted by the bright spring sunlight that floods in through the windows of the carriage on both sides.

They rock back and forth with the rhythm of the train, as Ren watches the light dance across Goro's features. The fingers of his left hand are entwined with the ones on Goro's right, and, as Tokyo whizzes by them, for a moment, it's like they're the only people in the world. Even while they're surrounded by the other commuters.

But the train journey from Shibuya to Yongen has always been short, and it isn't long before the spell is broken by the cheerful, polite recording that informs them they've reached their destination.

Goro smiles at him, squeezes his hand, once, and then lets go. Ren wants to reach out and pull him back, but he jams his hands into his pockets instead, and then follows Goro and what's left of the crowd off the train.

Navigating the backstreets and entering Leblanc for what's going to be the last time for months feels unreal.

The usually welcoming tinkle of the bell over the door, the low sound of the TV, and even Sojiro's gruff greeting all have the same bittersweet ring to them.

"Hey, Sojiro," Ren responds, at the same time that Goro says, "Good afternoon, Sakura-san."

"Hey!" Futaba squawks through a mouthful of food, popping up from where she was hidden — hunched over her laptop and a steaming plate of curry — in the centre booth. "What am I, chopped liver?"

Sojiro tuts under his breath. "Don't mind her. She's just cranky because she had to get up early for the second day in a row."

"Yeah, that's what's wrong with me — it's definitely not because I stayed up all night playing Flame Insignia," she whispers to Ren and Goro conspiratorially, but still loud enough that Sojiro obviously hears too.

If his sigh is anything to go by, anyway.

"You boys sit down; I'll get you some lunch—" Sojiro lifts a hand to stop Ren in his tracks as he moves to go grab his apron. "I said sit down, Kid. Let me fix you something to eat."

Ren holds his hands up, does as he's told, and steps away from the apron. Slipping onto the stool beside Goro instead. "Thanks, Sojiro."

Sojiro just waves him off (like always) as he starts making his way to the kitchen nook, but then he pauses and looks back over his shoulder. Right at Goro. "You need something other than curry, Akechi?"

Goro makes a surprised sound and then smiles a small and tight-lipped smile. "Thank you for asking, Sakura-san, but I should be fine, as long as Ren hasn't had a hand in making it."

Ren bites his lip and tries not to laugh. Futaba doesn't even try.

"Yes, yes," Goro grouses. "My suffering is hilarious."

Ren's proud of him for being just a little put out by the teasing. Instead of taking it personally, like he did yesterday.

"Hey, Ren," Futaba pipes up, and they both turn to look at her. She doesn't flinch, not even a little. Ren's proud all over again. "I hope you're not forgetting about my compensation for yesterday!"

"Ah — I hadn't realised!" Goro says, nearly falling over himself. "Shido's credit card is still functional, I can—"

Futaba looks like she just hit the jackpot. Ren steps in before things get any more out of hand. "She doesn't want money, Goro."

"Then what—" he starts, at the same time that Futaba mutters, "I don't not want money."

"Instant yakisoba. She wants weird, limited-edition flavours of instant yakisoba."

"They brought back the apple pie one that I missed out on last time! And it's already sold out everywhere online!"

Goro blinks once, twice, and recovers.

"It's my debt, and I'll be the one to pay it," he says, sounding a strange mixture of resigned and determined. "Just point me in the direction of the store that sells it."

"I'll send you the list…" Futaba pushes her glasses up her nose, and the light above her casts a glare across the lenses that obscures her eyes. "And the number of units required."

Goro turns and gives him a long-suffering look that says, 'What have I gotten myself into?' Ren just smiles and shrugs back at him.

Then Sojiro sets two steaming plates of curry on the counter in front of them, and two equally hot cups of coffee aren't far behind. Ren hadn't even noticed them being poured. They say their thanks, and Sojiro ignores them, more interested in leaning back against the shelves of beans behind him and watching Goro with sharp consideration instead.

"So, Akechi," he starts, stroking his beard with one hand. "Have you thought about what you're going to do? Now that—"

"Now that he knows he can't get himself arrested," Ren mumbles around a spoonful of curry, not able to help himself.

"Well, Sakura-san," Goro says, aiming an askance and truly withering glare in Ren's direction, before he turns his attention back to Sojiro. "I have a meeting with Sae-san this afternoon to discuss my options, but beyond that? I couldn't say."

"Have you got a place to stay?"

"As I mentioned earlier, I still have access to the 'expense account' from when I was working with Shido. That should help me get by, at least for a while… and if that dries up, I also know of a few places that will let you work for food and board," he says. "Going back to the apartment is another option, I suppose, but I don't know how safe that would be in the long-term…" Trailing off, he fidgets with the cuffs of his sleeves for a second before standing abruptly. "I'm sorry, please excuse me for a moment."

The three of them watch Goro disappear into the bathroom and close the door behind him with a soft click. It's very quiet and very tense all of a sudden.

Ren swallows the curry in his mouth without really tasting it.

There has to be something they can do, right? Goro can't just be homeless?

Ren's trying to decide if he should get up and go check on him, when Sojiro sighs and runs a hand back through his hair. "Leave it with me, Kid."

Hope bubbles up and breaks through the mess of worry that's making Ren's chest feel like it's too small.

"You can help?" Ren asks, spinning back around in his seat. Maybe with a little too much intensity, because Sojiro clears his throat and breaks eye contact.

"I'm not making any promises… But I still have some strings left that I can pull. I'll see if I can find him something more secure, at least."

Futaba makes a pleased little 'heh' sound and grins. "Sojiro is Best Dad. No contest."

"No argument here," Ren agrees.

And if Sojiro seemed flustered before, then it's nothing compared to the way he reacts now. Reaching up like he needs to adjust his glasses (but definitely actually hiding his face) as he retreats back into the kitchen, mumbling something about having to check on the curry.

It isn't long after that when Goro reappears. Not a hair out of place. That he's a little paler than usual is the only thing that really gives away the fact that he's not at a hundred percent.

Reaching out to squeeze his wrist as he retakes his seat, Ren leans in and (carefully) asks, "You okay?"

"I'm fine." It's not very convincing, not with the way he reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose between two fingers. "I suppose that the reality of the situation hadn't quite sunk in."

Ren's immediate instinct is to tell him that Sojiro might be able to help, but he keeps his mouth shut, figuring that it's not really his place to bring it up… and also, what if it ends up being a dead-end? Despite Sojiro's best efforts.

So he goes a different way.

"Do you think that Niijima-san can help with, uh — with your living situation?"

Taking a sip of his coffee, Goro seems to mull the question over for a second before he answers. "She might, but given my age, I have a feeling that any accommodation she would recommend would involve going back into the system… And I would very much like to avoid that."

Ren opens his mouth and then closes it again just as quickly, stopping himself before he says something really dumb like: 'Can't be worse than being homeless, though, right?' Because he doesn't actually know that, does he? And he definitely doesn't know what it was like for Goro.

So he says nothing, and they eat their lunch in relative silence after that. Ren finds himself caught somewhere between not really tasting his food because he's too distracted with being worried about Goro, and trying to force himself to enjoy it. He might be able to make a decent curry himself now, but it'll be months before he can have Sojiro's again, and he doesn't want to waste it by not paying attention.

"Well," Goro sighs once they're done, setting his cup down with a finality that makes Ren's heart lurch. "I do actually have some errands that I need to take care of before my meeting with Sae-san... and as much as I'd like to stay, I should probably take my leave."

Ren's not usually clumsy, but he moves to stand up so quickly that he nearly trips over the base of his stool and his own two feet. "I'll walk you out!"

After Goro's said thank you and goodbye to Sojiro and Futaba, they leave the café and close the door behind them. There's no getting around how awkward it feels, or how tense it is, once they're outside. Ren isn't quite sure how they're even supposed to say goodbye properly when they're essentially standing in the middle of the street. Goro's on top of things, though, reaching down to tug at the cuff of Ren's sleeve as he starts walking.

Ren follows him. Across the street and into the empty laundromat.

The smell of detergent, and even the flowery fabric softener, have never been quite enough to cover up the dank, mildewy mustiness that hangs in the air in here. It's always kept clean enough — having to use the bathhouse as much as he has means that Ren's seen how the old couple who own the place scrub it from top to bottom regularly — but he can still see the mould stains in the corners, and the spots where the paint has cracked and split from the damp.

Goro's shoulders go tense for a second as they cross the threshold, his nose crinkling up at the smell, exactly like it had when they came here together in January to discuss all the crazy stuff that was happening. The déjà vu is disorienting at first, almost like vertigo — and Ren is actually worried that he might need to sit down before his legs go out from underneath him — but then Goro turns to catch both of his hands in his own and pulls Ren close, and the weird feeling disappears. Nothing could be further from the way things were in January. When he was still reeling over Futaba's mom being not-dead and Morgana suddenly being an unsettlingly hot dude.

When Goro had been standing across the room from him, uneasy and defensive, like a wary dog with its hackles up.

Sunlight streams in through the row of windows, slanted and bright, making the dust motes seem to dance in the air around Goro. His expression is open, vulnerable, but still burns with the intensity that Ren has come to expect from him. Just another one of the essential things that makes Goro Goro. His eyes flit down to Ren's lips, an echo of the tense moment they shared on Saturday night, just before they crossed this line for the first time.

"Kiss me."

It isn't a request.

Ren is happy to oblige all the same.

He leans in slowly, running the tip of his nose along the bridge of Goro's as he tilts his head to bring their lips together. It's soft, tender. Loving. Ren is expecting Goro to try and turn the kiss into something rough, but he seems to be happy to follow Ren's lead this time, almost melting against him when he cups his cheek with one hand and slides the other into the long hair at the back of his neck.

There's desperation underneath the softness. Anguish under the love. So much has happened in such a short window of time, and now they can both feel it closing.

When they pull apart, only slightly, Goro's eyes are bright and wet.

Ren knows that he's not any better.

"Considering the circumstances under which we've parted before," Goro whispers, slightly wry, breath ghosting across Ren's lips, "I feel that this shouldn't be as difficult as it is."

That shocks a small, breathy laugh out of him. "Who are you trying to convince here? Me or you?"

"Both, probably."

Goro's right, though, isn't he? This should be easier than the other times, and by a wide margin.

But...

"It's not the same."

"Hm? How so?"

"I can't really explain it… but Shido's Palace, the fight with Maruki-sensei… everything was moving so fast, and the stakes were different — higher — and, uh…" Ren pauses and chews his bottom lip. "I guess I hadn't really believed we were saying goodbye. Not for real, anyway. I think I knew — deep down — that you'd come back."

Chuckling and squeezing his hand, Goro looks at him with fond disbelief. "Of course you did — too stubborn to accept what was right in front of you — and rightly so." Goro pulls away just enough to gesture at himself with his right hand. "After all, here I am."

With a tug, Ren pulls him right back in, kisses the corner of his mouth, the bridge of his nose, between his eyebrows. "There you are."

"And I'm not going anywhere now either," Goro says, heart-achingly sincere, before he smiles and rolls his eyes. "You and your meddling friends made sure of that, remember?"

Pointing out that Goro wouldn't be able to get himself arrested, even if he tried, isn't really the same as doing something to stop it from happening, but Ren gets what he's trying to say anyway. And it's hard to focus on anything else when his heart is still too busy doing a little dance about the 'I'm not going anywhere' part.

There's still this little thread of insecurity, though. Something that's been bothering him ever since he realised that Goro didn't seem to have any idea about what he was going to do with his life, post-Shido, and Ren can't help but pull at it now.

"So, you're really not… leaving?"

Looking a little surprised at the question, Goro tilts his head to one side and makes a thoughtful humming sound before answering with one of his own. "Where else would I go?"

That should do it, right? Everything's fine; they can continue with their goodbye. But it's not fine, not really. Not while this is still up in the air.

Ren looks away, shrugs. Kind of wishes he'd just kept his mouth shut. What's he even going to say? 'What were you going to do if the whole revenge thing worked out, Goro? After the dust settled? Because I'm starting to believe you didn't think you had to plan that far ahead, and if I think about you not having a plan, then I have to think about why you didn't have a plan, and that scares me.'

"I dunno..." he mumbles instead, trying to focus on an especially mouldy spot in the corner of the room while intense, searching, knowing eyes bore into him.

"Ren…" Goro sighs, reaching up to cup the edge of his jaw in his palm. "I never thought — never needed to think about my future, until you came along and thoroughly ruined everything I'd ever worked for, literally dragged me out of limbo, twice, made me confront my feelings, and then proceeded to complete me in a way that I didn't dare to think was possible.

"Please believe me when I say that, truly, I have no plans to go anywhere." With gentle, firm pressure, Goro tilts Ren's chin so that he has to make full eye contact. The role-reversal isn't lost on him. "And I mean that in any and every ridiculous way that you might be choosing to interpret the phrase."

Ren searches Goro's face — his eyes — looking for anything that might give away that he isn't being honest, but he sees nothing but love, concern, and maybe a bit of affectionate exasperation. Ren feels himself relax. A little.

"Okay," he whispers, swallowing around the painful lump in his throat. "I believe you."

And Ren means it. He's just going to have to stop freaking out about how things might have turned out before, because so much has happened, and so much could have happened. He'll drive himself crazy thinking about all the what ifs.

Things are different.

What they have now is what matters.

Seemingly satisfied that Ren's convinced, Goro slides his hand along his jaw, around the back of his neck, and pulls him in close again. Ren goes gladly, nestling his nose into the space just above Goro's collar. Making believe that the last of his anxiety is carried away with each little puff of breath against his boyfriend's skin.

They stay like that for what's probably only a handful of minutes, clinging to each other in a semi-public place while one of the machines against the wall rattles away noisily on uneven legs, but it feels so much longer. Like time stretches a little, just for them.

Ren thinks he sees something from the corner of his eye, a brief flutter of blue in the air, but he blinks, and it's gone. If it ever was there at all.

Thank you, he thinks anyway.

"Ren," Goro whispers, and Ren knows what's coming before he says it. "We can't stay here forever… and I really do have a train to catch."

"Yeah…"

They make their way to the doorway, fingers laced together again, and when Goro moves to take his hand back — to make themselves presentable to the outside world — Ren tightens his grip instead.

Goro turns, eyebrows raised, mouth parted on a question for half a second, before he gets it. Smiling in understanding, in a soft, tender way that makes Ren's heart swell and ache, Goro squeezes his hand right back, and they step out into the sunshine together.

Walking down the backstreets that lead to the station, hand in hand, does earn them a few looks (the kindly old man who feeds Yongen's stray cats does a double take so hard that Ren thinks he hears the bones in his neck crack), but it turns out that the world doesn't end.

And Ren would know. It wouldn't be the first time he's seen it almost happen, after all.

Never one to stay quiet for long, Goro speaks up again. "It occurs to me, Ren," he says, "that we never really spoke about the fact that you've been sleeping with my old tie."

"We did. I already told you, it's my tie," Ren deadpans, trying his absolute hardest to keep a straight face, but man, it's difficult when Goro's eyes go all wide in exasperated disbelief. "But if we're bringing up things we haven't had the chance to talk about… how about you, getting up before the sun, to do sit-ups — in the dark. Half naked."

Goro goggles at him. "You were awake?"

"Barely," Ren laughs, finally starting to lose it. "What were you even doing?"

"Being considerate!" Goro huffs, indignant but still clearly amused. "Would you have preferred that I left you alone in the apartment for an hour while I went cycling instead?"

"Oh, right… I guess that makes sense. Kind of."

"Why do you sound disappointed?"

Ren's about to say something — something witty and devastatingly funny. Probably — but he's distracted by the fact that they're suddenly out of street (and time), having turned the corner that leaves them right in front of the station.

"Well, this is it." Goro sounds about as resigned as Ren feels.

"You should just come with me," Ren jokes, or tries to anyway. It comes out sounding more serious than he meant it to, mostly because it is exactly what he wants. Even if it wouldn't work, like, at all.

"Ah, yes, I'm sure that your parents would love that," Goro chuckles under his breath, "do they even know that you're bringing Morgana home with you?"

Ren knew there was something else he was forgetting.

"Uh, yeah… of course they do," he bluffs (badly), and Goro laughs at him again.

He should probably send his mom a text or something. Give her the heads-up.

Maybe she'll even reply this time.

"My train is in less than five minutes… I need to head inside," Goro mutters, checking his phone and chewing his lip. "While you really need to get back to the café and finish packing… And actually, speaking of, do try to be careful with your tie while you're packing it away. We both know you won't be able to redo the knot if it comes undone."

Ren laughs, rough and affectionate. "I love you."

"I love you too, Ren."

They share a quick kiss — too quick, but even Ren doesn't want to risk making out in the middle of the street — and then Goro is walking away. Ren just watches for a second, frozen, but then, a little lightbulb goes off in his head, and he jogs after him.

"Wait!" Ren calls out, pulling the glasses off his face as he runs. Goro turns back around to face him, looking understandably confused when Ren pushes the frames into his left hand. "Take these with you."

"What—"

"I have the tie, and your glove, but you don't have anything that belongs to me." He folds Goro's fingers around the glasses and squeezes gently. "And they look better on you anyway."

"That is categorically false, Ren, and we both know it," Goro snorts, rolls his eyes, and then carefully tucks them into the breast pocket of his blazer. "But thank you…"

That's when they hear the sound of a train pulling into the station.

"Shit," Goro hisses, scrambling to pull out his wallet and find his rail pass. "I have to go."

"Yeah, I know," Ren admits glumly, and they share one last desperate look (and another hurried kiss) before Goro turns away again. He's just about to push through the glass door and go inside when Ren calls after him. "Don't try to sleep with the glasses on! They just stab you in the face!"

Goro honks an inelegant, surprised-sounding laugh, and Ren's chest clenches. God, he loves him so much. "I wasn't planning on it!"

And then, that's it. He disappears into the building.

Goro's actually gone.

Ren stands there for another moment or two, feeling lost, before he finally manages to convince his feet to start moving. Drifting back through the streets and into the café on autopilot, the very first thing he notices, as his eyes readjust to Leblanc's dark interior, is that his and Goro's dishes have already been cleared away.

It's a nice gesture, of course, just like the lunch, but Ren is kind of sad that they're gone. Which is probably weird, right? They're just dirty dishes.

What was he going to do? Build a shrine?

Sojiro was wiping the counter down, but he stopped when Ren came in, and he's looking at him now in a way that seems just as nostalgic as it is sympathetic.

"I sent Futaba upstairs with a bundle of old newspapers," he says. Voice low and so gentle that Ren's eyes immediately start burning again. "You've still got some stuff to pack, right?"

Ren looks away, clears his throat — so he can actually thank Sojiro without his voice wobbling too badly — and tries to ignore just how heavy his feet feel as he heads for the stairs.

Up in the attic, Futaba is sitting on the couch, tapping away on her phone, with a pile of newspapers that's nearly as big as she is next to her. She looks up as Ren reaches the top of the stairs and gives him a sheepish smile.

Ren's returning it when he notices the boxes of Goro's things, stacked over in the corner, tucked in between his plant and the bannister, and realises that he'd forgotten all about them. A confusing wave of relief washes over him as he approaches them and reaches out to run his fingers over the cardboard. The weird twisty feeling in his stomach when he'd seen the plates were gone downstairs is making a bit more sense now.

Ren thinks he'd nearly convinced himself that he imagined everything the second that Goro disappeared out of sight.

Here his things are, though. Solid physical proof that it was all real.

"Ren…" Futaba says, and there's so much sympathy in her voice that Ren immediately feels bad. She's probably thinking about how she felt after her mom died, and Goro isn't dead.

Goro isn't dead.

Ren shakes himself off, metaphorically, smiles at Futaba in a way that he hopes is reassuring, and heads over to grab a sheet of newspaper off the top of the pile.

The silence in the attic isn't uncomfortable while he and Futaba wrap and box all of his souvenirs — they often work side by side without really saying much — but there's still something in the air, even though he's pretty sure that he defused most of the tension earlier. It's like she wants to talk to him but doesn't know where to start. Ren has no idea what's going on, or what it might be about, but he figures that if he gets the ball rolling, then she'll probably get there herself.

That's what usually does the trick.

And he'd be lying if he said that he wasn't also kind of hoping for a distraction.

"Futaba," he starts, softly and carefully, but still isn't really surprised when she squeaks, jumps and nearly drops the little newspaper bundle she's holding at the sound of his voice. He knew something was up. "I really appreciate everything you did to help Goro. I know it can't have been easy."

"S'nothin'," she scoffs, flustered, but clearly pleased. Things go quiet again, and Ren is starting to think that maybe he was wrong and that might be it, after all, but then she clears her throat and, in a very small voice, says, "C-can I ask for a favour? Before you go?"

Futaba's pale, but the apples of her cheeks are red, and she's avoiding eye contact entirely. Ren hasn't seen her like this since the first couple of shaky weeks after she joined the Phantom Thieves.

Or that time she tried to confess to him.

Uh-oh.

"Sure, what's up?"

"S-s-s-s-su-su-mire!" she almost yells, hands balled into small, white-knuckled fists at her sides. Ren jumps, and actually looks over his shoulder, nearly expecting the girl in question to have appeared in the attic with them.

Seconds tick by. There doesn't seem to be a follow-up to the outburst. And she's even more red now. Ren is kind of worried that she's going to pass out or something.

Seriously, is she even breathing?!

Acting without thinking, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. "Text it to me instead?"

Futaba finally exhales, and sags in on herself, almost deflating in relief as she drops down to sit on the floor. Grabbing her own phone, she starts typing furiously.

-Futaba Sakura-
19/03/2017
12:42 p.m.

Futaba: thanks
Futaba: dunno why its so hard

Ren: It's no problem
Ren: Take your time

And she does. Sitting there, almost chewing through her lip as she writes and erases text after text, but eventually, Ren's screen lights up again.

Futaba: ok
Futaba: u know the way Sumires phone is basically bricked

Not what he was expecting, but okay. He has a suspicion about where this might actually be going (especially with how Futaba's been acting) and he's more than happy to play a little matchmaker before he leaves.

Ren: Sure?

Futaba: i think i can fix it
Futaba: i *dont* think i can ask her tho
Futaba: too high level

Ren: No problem
Ren: I can send her a text
Ren: Let her know that the Futaba Sakura repair shop is open for business

Futaba: (⌒▽⌒)☆

Maybe it's because he's been spending too much time with Goro, but Ren only hesitates for a second before he decides to push a little.

Ren: Finally going to initiate that romance sub-quest?

Her reaction is immediate and explosive.

Futaba makes a loud choking, spluttering noise, and (with the way she starts fumbling with it) it's suddenly like her phone is covered with oil. He watches the little lime green rectangle slip out of her fingers and flip through the air in what feels like slow motion. It hits the floor and bounces once, twice, and then lands face down with an ominous smack.

Ren winces and hopes that his teasing didn't just shatter her screen. "Uh… is it okay?"

Futaba reaches out, picks it up, and nods jerkily, robotically, as she swipes at the screen with her sleeve. Her hands are shaking so badly that it nearly falls again.

Wow, he really should have just kept his big mouth (fingers?) shut.

"Futaba, I'm sorry," he tries, and winces again when she looks back at him with wide, wounded eyes. Ren feels terrible. "I've had this hunch about you liking her for a while, and I was just kidding around… I didn't mean to freak you out."

"I l-like her?" Futaba almost whispers, and then shakes her head violently. "I mean! You think I like her?"

Oh, she didn't know.

Crap.

Then a thought creeps up on him, one that makes him feel about a million times more guilty than he already did.

What if this is his fault?

Back when she was gearing up to confess to him last year, he'd tried to let her down gently, making out that the way she was feeling was just how things were between friends. It never occurred to him that she might end up not being able to tell the difference.

And maybe it hadn't even really been for her benefit after all? Ren thinks, unhappily. Hadn't he just been doing what was easiest for him instead of thinking about his friend's needs?

At least he can try to fix it now.

"Well, how do you feel when you're with her?"

Futaba buries her face in her hands and groans.

"How about when she laughs?"

She just groans louder, pulls her hood up, and then tugs the drawstring tight. Until all he can see of her face is a shiny sliver of glasses.

"Look, it's just something to think about, okay?" Ren shrugs and starts wrapping his Jack Frost plushie in newspaper — it's soft, so it doesn't really need the protection, but he's just looking for something to do so Futaba doesn't feel like all his attention is on her. Maybe stop her from feeling so cornered. Hopefully.

Five minutes pass. Ten minutes pass. Ren's pretty much finished packing when she finally speaks up again. Although all he hears is a garbled mumble, because she's still hiding in her hoodie.

"Futaba, I can't—"

"You're right, okay?!" she yells, yanking her hood back down. Her glasses are all fogged up, and her hair is a frizzy, staticky mess. "I've just been too much of a dumbbutt to realise! Ugh!"

"Hey," Ren soothes, crossing the attic to join her on the floor. "You're not a dumbbutt. This stuff is hard."

Sniffling, she lifts her glasses out of the way so that she can rub at her eyes. "It is hard."

He reaches out and pats the crown of her head, smoothing down a little of the frizziness and, most importantly, finally getting her to smile again. "I know we just packed it away... but wanna have a couple of games of Star Forneus? I think I'm finally good enough to beat your high score."

She laughs, and it's a bit shaky and hiccupy, but it's still a laugh, so Ren counts it as a win. "Pfft, bring it on."

…

After having his ass handed to him four times over, Ren knows that he's reached the point where he does actually have to leave. Futaba helps him bundle the console back up and even chews him out for wrapping the cables too tightly around the controllers ('You're stressing the connection point! Seriously, do you want frayed wires?!'), before they head for the stairs.

"You really messed up our schedule for today, you know that, right?"

"What? For your surprise?" Ren asks, smiling and wiggling his fingers on the last word.

"Yeah, me 'n Ann were supposed to go into Shibuya together to meet up with everyone else before you got there..." She sighs a long-suffering sigh. "I guess I'll just have to go with you now."

"Hey, you two," Sojiro greets them as they walk into the café, and then tips his chin towards Ren. "You got everything?"

Ren just nods. This is his second proper goodbye, and it's already real rough.

"When I took you in, I thought that I was the one helping you… but it turns out it was the other way around." Sojiro is clearly emotional, but it's not like he's sad — or only like he's sad — he sounds proud. Ren wants to record it and play it back for his parents. "Take care of yourself, okay?"

Ren opens his mouth without thinking. "I'm finally free from my attic prison."

Futaba snorts, loudly, and Sojiro huffs a laugh too. "Well, that's a cold thing to say."

"Really, though," Ren says. Not realising he's playing with his bangs until his finger gets badly tangled. Ouch. "Thanks for everything."

"You're always welcome here, Kid, even if it's just for a cup of coffee." Sojiro wipes his hands off on his apron and chuckles. "I guess that means I'll have to put off retirement for a couple more years, though, huh?"

There's a lump in Ren's throat. He's not sure what else to say.

He's not sure whether he could say anything anyway.

It's like Sojiro knows. "What're you doing? Hurry up and go. You don't want to miss your train."

Futaba's pushing him out the door now, which is good, because Ren doesn't know if he'd have been able to start moving otherwise. "See ya, Sojiro!" she calls over her shoulder.

The walk back to the train station passes in a bit of a blur for Ren, as he tries not to think too hard about the last time he walked the route. His only real anchor is having to pay just enough attention to what Futaba is saying to know when to nod.

And then, once they're on the actual train, Futaba makes a beeline for an empty seat at the back of the carriage, and Ren has to focus on staying close to her. Making sure that he's between her and the other passengers as much as he can.

She's already tapping away on her phone when he takes the seat beside her. "Everyone's s'posed to be waiting for us at Shibuya crossing, just, uh, just FYI."

Well, it's not really going to be everyone everyone, is it? Still, Ren's heart swells at the idea of seeing most of his friends again. Though, there is one thing he needs to take care of first. "I have to make a stop before we go and meet the others — just off Central Street — shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes."

From Futaba's perspective, anyway.

Lavenza wouldn't be too happy with him if he just left Tokyo without stopping by. Even if she probably could just pull him into the Velvet Room tonight, after he's back in Kanbara.

Which reminds him, he also needs to send texts to all of his non-Metaverse-related friends, apologising for not coming to see them before he left. But when he pulls out his phone and opens the chat app, he finds his thumb hovering over his private thread with Goro instead. Tapping the little information icon in the corner, he takes a second to change his boyfriend's display name from 'Akechi' to 'Goro'.

The way it should be.

And then he starts typing.

-Goro Akechi-
19/03/2017
1:37 p.m.

Ren: I'll be back before you know it

His message is marked as read almost immediately, and Ren wonders if Goro was about to send him something, or if he was just sitting there, staring at his screen and waiting. It's not the first time it's happened. Just another one of those funny Goro Things that Ren has always found way more endearing than creepy.

Goro: I would expect nothing less.
Goro: You still owe me a duel, after all.

Smiling, Ren snorts fondly to himself. Beside him, Futaba rolls her eyes and mouths the word 'gross' in his general direction. Ren just smiles wider.

Ren: I love you

Goro: And I you, Ren.

Chapter Text

For Goro, having to run to catch his train is an immediate and welcome distraction.

Yongen-Jaya's train station is never anywhere near as busy as any of the ones deeper in the city, but with the holiday, there's still a decent crowd, and he has to navigate through (and around) several groups of people before he reaches his platform and manages to squeeze onto a carriage.

Just in time.

Now that he's actually on the train, however, Goro's starting to think that he should have grabbed a rental bike instead.

Because he's sitting now, and if he's sitting, then he's not moving, and if he's not moving, then he's thinking.

And if he allows himself to think, then he's going to fucking drown.

The way that so many people think it is for sharks. That they must keep swimming, lest they suffocate and die.

Of course, Goro knows that isn't actually true for the vast majority of sharks, because he did the research — before inviting Ren to the aquarium. Made sure he was armed with every fascinating little factoid about aquatic life that he possibly could be, and then proceeded to spend most of the visit being too distracted by Ren's pretty reflection in the shiny surface of the tanks to actually bring up half of them.

God, what a lovesick, oblivious moron he'd been.

Regardless, and accuracy notwithstanding, he still feels like he needs to move. Now. Before everything starts trying to catch up with him.

Because Goro used to know what he was — used to have a very concrete idea of where exactly he stood in the world — but now? What does he have?

A fledgling relationship. A plan for the future that spans approximately three hours. And a pair of fake glasses burning a hole in the pocket right next to his heart.

Reaching up to run his fingers over them, through the material of his blazer, Goro thinks that perhaps Ren was onto something — sleeping with his tie — because it's surprisingly… grounding. Even just touching the glasses brings to mind a clear image of the stupidly earnest look on Ren's face as he chased after him to push the ridiculous things into his hand. The more he thinks about it, in fact, the more the hammering of his heart slows, until it's something slightly more manageable — still racing in his chest, yes, but not trying to thump its way through his ribcage anymore.

Thinking of Ren is a double-edged sword, of course, tinged bittersweet by the knowledge that it's going to be quite some time before they can see each other again. But still, the warm glow in his chest is bright enough to dispel some of the panicky gloom, and that allows him to focus on what he needs to do before his meeting with Sae.

Not that any of it's especially complicated, mind you. It's just that doing a quick run-through of an impending task always helps him get his thoughts in order.

Or at least under control.

On the thirteenth of December, just before he'd entered Shido's Palace for the last time, Goro visited one of the old coin lockers near the Diet building. The same one that he'd been using for almost a year at that point, having paid one of the attendants a substantial sum of Shido's dirty money to keep it topped up, just in case he wasn't able to stay on top of it himself. Of course, he'd only been imagining leaving it for a day or two, at most, but that small, pragmatic decision should serve him just as well now, after leaving the locker unused for three months.

Because it's starting to feel like the contents could be (or at least have the potential to be) significant.

While he had used the little metal box for its intended purpose — a convenient place to store his things while he was working around the city — it was also where he'd started squirrelling away what he'd hoped would be his own little insurance policy.

Over time, as he worked under Shido and alongside the other members of the conspiracy, Goro had been happy to take advantage of their tendency to treat him like an actual, normal intern. Using every opportunity available to him to photograph and photocopy the documents they tasked him with ferrying back and forth.

The idea was to have something — anything, really — that he could use to take down as many people as possible, as quickly as possible, if Shido had ever shown any signs that he'd figured out what Goro was actually up to.

It's ridiculous (and actually pretty fucking embarrassing, honestly), looking back on it now. When so much of the police force and prosecutor's office had been in his father's pocket, it's not as if any amount of evidence — no matter how damning — would have actually made a difference.

But the Phantom Thieves cut the head off the proverbial snake in December, didn't they?

And now, even though he's not sure how much of the evidence he gathered might actually be needed after Shido's confession, there still seems to be a non-zero chance that Sae might be able to make use of the information. To help track down perhaps, or convict, any remaining members of the conspiracy that might have otherwise escaped.

The couple of folders of incriminating documents aren't the only things that he'd left in that coin locker, either. His attaché case is in there too, along with a small amount of cash.

More significantly, however, is that it's also where he'd left the gun.

The real one.

A SIG Sauer P230. The same make and model favoured by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, and therefore, of course, also the same make and model that he'd commandeered from the hapless guard in the underground interrogation room, pressed to Ren's forehead, and then proceeded to blow his lovely brains out with.

Fuck.

Pressing on the glasses in his pocket more firmly — until the plastic frames creak — Goro exhales slowly through his nose and forces himself to continue working through the details.

The P230 that's waiting for him in the coin locker isn't the one he used in that interrogation room, of course. That specific weapon was supposed to have been processed (in only the very loosest sense of the word) along with all the other evidence related to the untimely suicide of the leader of the Phantom Thieves. And perhaps that is where it ended up — gathering dust amongst the rest of the forged evidence — but it's hard to say for sure, not when he still doesn't know exactly how Ren escaped his assassination plot.

The gun he's on his way to collect now was given to him by Shido quite early on in their 'partnership', and never used outside of a firing range (well, technically. He had brought it with him for the duel with Ren in Mementos in November, and real firearms, it turns out, function identically to fakes when one is in the Metaverse). He's under no illusions about the weapon's traceability, of course. Shido never would have given it to him in the first place if it could have been connected with him. But just like the documents, it might still be useful to the investigation in some way.

And even if it isn't, he'll be more than glad to be rid of the thing.

Nauseous dread continues to roll and twist in his stomach at the thought of laying eyes on a gun again, even in its case. Touching it. Feeling the unmistakable weight and heft of the P230 in his hands.

Remembering the resistance of the trigger as he pulled it.

Mercifully, that's when the train stops at Shibuya Station, and Goro is moving again. Through the horde of warm bodies, up concrete steps and back out into the sunlight. Straight to the rack of rental bikes. Not stopping for a second, he opens the bike-share app on his phone, gets a code, and then he's off. Zipping through Tokyo's busy streets, far too fast for any nasty, insidious thoughts to catch up with him.

It probably takes him just under twenty minutes to reach his destination. He rides the bike right up to the sheltered area that houses the lockers before dismounting, and, after a moment's deliberation, decides to leave it resting against the wall.

Hopefully it won't be stolen in the five minutes he's away from it.

Taking a breath and preparing himself for the unpleasantness of what's going to come next, Goro decides that there might be some value in checking to see if anything else from Ren might help to anchor him. The glasses had certainly made a difference (and still are, in fact) so it seems like a sound enough hypothesis. He pulls his phone from his pocket and opens their private chat thread, intending to read back over some of the texts that Ren had sent him while he'd been asleep (if that's even the right word for it) in the Velvet Room.

He hasn't even had the chance to start scrolling back up through the thread before he sees the little flashing row of ellipses at the bottom that means Ren is typing something.

Well, that's fortuitous.

-Ren Amamiya-
19/03/2017
1:37 p.m.

Ren: I'll be back before you know it

It's like he knew that Goro was struggling, somehow. There would have been a time when that might have bothered him, but it has the opposite effect now, soothing and smoothing the jagged edges of his nerves.

He's not so self-involved, either, that he doesn't recognise the fact that Ren is probably also reaching out for exactly the same kind of reassurance that Goro himself was looking for by opening this chat in the first place… and well, at least it's easier to put on a brave face when they're communicating over text.

Goro: I would expect nothing less.
Goro: You still owe me a duel, after all.

Ren: I love you

Goro's heart swells in his chest.

Goro: And I you, Ren.

Resolve renewed, Goro slides his phone back into his pocket and walks briskly down the right-hand side row of lockers. Coming to a stop in front of 'his' one, he reaches for the small keypad and starts to punch the code in from memory.

Then something — something he really should have thought of before now — occurs to him.

What if the attendant he paid off had forgotten that he'd done it at all?

What if the fact that Goro himself existed had just slipped his mind? Just like with the cashier in the convenience store this morning.

The locker would have been cleared out months ago if that was the case, and once the gun was discovered, the evidence he'd collected would have been handed over to the corrupt police along with it, and then, most likely, destroyed.

But then he presses the 'enter' key, the screen lights up with a bright green check mark, and some of the tension in Goro's shoulders eases away, even more so when the door clicks open, and the silver edge of his attaché case catches the light.

It does raise the question of why exactly he doesn't seem to have been forgotten, of course, in this one particular instance. Goro makes a mental note to discuss this apparent discrepancy in how anonymous he's become with Sakura Futaba at his first opportunity.

The gun is exactly where he left it, in its unassuming black rectangular case, pushed right up against the back of the locker. As far out of sight as possible. It's something he's thankful for now, allowing him to handle it mostly blind. The case is awkward and heavy. Heavier than the gun itself. Which is to be expected, given the fact that the case also holds the single box of ammunition he'd been provided with, but it's another little detail that allows him to maintain the fiction in his head — to convince himself that he's holding literally anything else — as he manoeuvres it into one of the top compartments inside his attaché case.

Still, self-delusion can only get one so far.

Most of Goro's knowledge of gun safety had been gleaned from (mostly foreign) enthusiast websites (making sure he'd been up to speed on the subject had not been one of Shido's priorities, unsurprisingly) and it's illogical, but his fingers flex and itch with the desire to pull the case back out, open it, and double check that the weapon isn't loaded.

Goro knows that he emptied it in November, though. Can remember vividly how he counted the unused rounds and slipped them back into their box in a neat little row. So, he'll just need to keep that in mind — use the memory to convince himself that it's not going to go off by itself the second he starts cycling again. Particularly when checking it now is not exactly feasible when there's a security camera on the wall behind him.

Quashing the impulse as best he can, he moves onto gathering the rest of the evidence. Sliding the three thick brown envelopes into one of the other compartments, tucked safely between the pages of some old history homework. With them taken care of, the last thing in the locker is the smaller, thinner envelope of cash, which he folds in two and slips into the pocket of his slacks. There should be just under 70,000 yen inside, which isn't really much to work with (particularly in Tokyo) but it's a reassuring buffer, nonetheless.

Attaché case feeling unpleasantly and ominously heavy as he makes his way back to where he'd left the bike (it's still there, thankfully), he tries not to flinch when it gets jostled and bounces as he mounts the saddle.

The ride back to Shibuya Station is slightly more fraught, and Goro is wondering if he should have arranged to meet Sae closer to the Diet building, when a powder blue van (almost certainly the same make and model that Morgana turns into in the Metaverse) honks at him as it drives by. It makes him jump in his seat so violently that he nearly falls off the bike entirely.

A familiar blonde head is hanging out the passenger side window, pigtails blowing wildly in the wind. Ann Takamaki waves at him with both arms, laughing and yelling at the top of her lungs. "Hiii, Gorooo!"

Thoroughly bewildered, Goro waves back without really thinking about it. It's only when he sees the nondescript (but incredibly, obviously, police-issue) sedan that's following them that he gets both feet firmly back on the pedals and sets off at speed.

Heart pounding, hair sticking sweatily to his forehead and getting in his eyes, Goro does his best to keep up, but it's not easy, and he loses sight of both vehicles more than once.

Then he turns a corner, and it's suddenly only the sedan in front of him — the Phantom Thieves having lived up to their name and given the police the slip. He watches the car slow down to a crawl, as the officers inside switch to checking parking spaces and side streets for any sign of the van they just lost sight of.

Allowing himself to relax (marginally), he pulls his bike up close to the sidewalk, resting one foot on the ground while he tries to catch his breath. Goro realises that he's only around the corner from the station now, and when he checks his phone, he finds that it's almost time for Ren's train.

Something that seems highly unlikely to be a coincidence.

But what on earth were the Phantom Thieves even doing?

They had mentioned last night that they were planning to catch Ren before he left, to say goodbye, but even to Goro it had been clear that there had been something else going on. Something that they were still playing close to their chests. But why the van? Had they hoped to drive Ren to the station? Or all the way home themselves?

More importantly, had Ren been in the van too?

The police clearly thought so, or thought that they'd be led to him, at the very least.

Why else would they have been following them?

Because Goro remembers just how little the conspiracy (Shido included) had focused on Ren's friends, thinking of them as nothing but harmless children without their charismatic leader to guide and unite them. It had been precisely the dismissive attitude that Goro had been happy to lean into, just after he thought that he'd killed Ren — back when Shido had started floating the idea of having the others taken care of too…

Brushing the hair back out of his face, he thinks about sending Ren (or maybe the group chat) a text — needing more information than what he's working with now — but then two men in suits jog past him on the pavement. A loud burst of distorted audio comes from one of their earpieces, and Goro catches just enough to know that it said something about their 'target' being in the station.

Well, Ren wasn't in the van then.

Goro props the bike up against the parking meter beside him and leaves it to run up the street, after the two men. He doesn't know what their goal is, or why exactly they're following Ren, and he might not be able to redirect them, but he can still distract them.

If nothing else, he can try to buy Ren enough time to get safely onto his train.

"Excuse me!" Goro calls out, very aware of how out of breath he sounds. If he's lucky, it'll just add a little authenticity to his act. "Officers!"

The two men stop and turn to look at him — their stupid fucking sunglasses doing very little to conceal their annoyance at being interrupted. The one on the right, in particular, looks like he probably would have charged ahead without stopping, if it wasn't for his partner.

Neither of them seems to recognise him.

It's something that Goro could have used in the past as an easy way to tell if they were part of the conspiracy. Obviously, it's not much of an indicator now.

"I'm sorry, kid, but we're in the middle of some important police business," the one on the left starts. He sounds exasperated, but not as unapproachable as first impressions might have made him seem. Coming across more like an indulgent parent that's been interrupted during an important conversation. Goro knows that this is the one he needs to focus on. "Is this about something urgent?"

Goro bows quickly. "Ah! Please excuse me!" Smiling earnestly and apologetically, he opens his wallet and slips his ID out of its little plastic window. He'd prefer not to give his real name, of course, but even the best bullshit can only get you so far. "I'm an intern with the prosecutor's office — I actually worked with former prosecutor Sae Niijima on her investigation into the Phantom Thieves — and I've been asked to assist you today in locating your target."

They both peer at his ID and then back up at him (probably wondering how the neat, put-together person in the picture turned into the wind-blown, sweaty mess in front of them), before sharing a look that Goro can almost hear. Clearly, they're both used to (and pissed off about) people above them making decisions without consulting them first.

Goro doubts that either of them has the balls to say or do anything about it.

Which suits him just fine.

"Alright…" The dickhead on the left squints at his ID again. "Akechi-kun. Stick close to us."

"Do you think he's dangerous, sir?" Goro asks, wide-eyed and awestruck, as they resume their half-jog to the station, and thinks about how he deserves an award for not laughing his ass off.

"He could be," the idiot says, almost preening, "but this is just surveillance, you should be safe."

Just surveillance?

To what end?

Goro knows that the police are aware of Ren's home address already… is this surveillance some kind of intimidation tactic? Or do they think the train trip is a decoy? That Ren is actually planning to slip away and go into hiding somewhere else?

Well, if the idea hadn't occurred to them before, he's sure that it has now, after the Phantom Thieves and their little van arrived on the scene.

Once they're inside the station, his new companions cross off each area they pass through, reporting it to whoever is on the other end of their earpieces. Scanning the digital signs hanging from the ceiling for some kind of clue, Goro tries to remember if Ren mentioned which platform his train was leaving from. Nothing jumps out at him, but that isn't much of a surprise. He doubts that Ren's little hometown would be the final stop on any one of the routes, so he'd need to know the specific line—

Goro almost stops dead in his tracks.

Ren is literally on the train pulled up to the platform next to them!

Sitting at the window and smiling down at something (probably Morgana) on the seat beside him, blissfully unaware that Goro and two police officers (who may or may not be associated with whatever is left of the conspiracy) are only a handful of feet away.

There isn't any way to divert their route now — it wouldn't make sense to double back over ground they've already covered — or to do anything other than walk in a straight line up the platform at this point, really, so Goro tries to keep them talking (and hopefully distracted) instead.

"Do you think he might have gone down into the shopping arcade? Try to lose you in the crowds, perhaps?"

He got lucky, really, bumping into the more talkative half of this particular pair of morons, because Goro cannot believe how much the man loves the sound of his own voice. Immediately, he launches into a well-loved, and almost certainly embellished, anecdote about pursuing some criminal in the past who had done exactly that.

Goro holds his breath as they walk past Ren's window, only allowing himself to watch his oblivious boyfriend from the corner of his eye. He thinks he might see Ren jerk a little in place, like he would if he had actually caught sight of him, but they're too far away now for Goro to tell, and there's no way he can look back without giving the game away entirely.

Then, his phone vibrates in his pocket, three short bursts that mean he's received a message, and Goro thanks nobody in particular that he'd had the presence of mind to set it to silent earlier. There's no way to know for sure (he's certainly not going to pull it out of his pocket now to check), but Goro can still make an educated guess about who sent it.

Ren must have noticed him walking past after all.

The train beside them finally starts moving, and Goro exhales through his nose.

He needs to explain to the Phantom Thieves that just because you've managed to shrug off one tail does not necessarily mean you've escaped all of them.

There hasn't been any more chatter over his more silent companion's earpiece, at least, so maybe he can indulge himself a little, and assume that none of them made their way onto the train.

He's still not sure how dangerous they might be, and maybe it's naïve, but it definitely feels like Ren will be safer once he's out of Tokyo and has the opportunity to drop off the Metropolitan Police's radar.

Now, there's just the matter of ridding himself of his new friends.

They're approaching the stairs at the entrance to the shopping arcade now, and Goro is trying to decide if he should attempt to lose them in the crowd himself — maybe add a fresh new twist to Officer Shithead's anecdote — when a flash of red catches his eye.

"A-akechi-san?!"

Sumire Yoshizawa is standing right beside them, one hand white knuckled and clutching the gym bag slung over her shoulder, while the other hangs, frozen in mid-air, where she'd been about to reach for the guardrail. She's staring at him in complete and utter shock.

Which is understandable.

Ren might have an excuse for being distracted over the last couple of days, but it obviously never occurred to any of his friends to let her know that he was back.

Whatever. It's fine. He can use this.

"Yoshizawa-san," he starts, eyes darting back and forth between her and the police officers, in what he hopes comes across as a bashful and self-conscious gesture. "I can explain everything, but now isn't the best time…"

"Uh-oh," the waste-of-breath-in-a-suit beside him mock whispers, elbowing his partner conspiratorially, "I think we should let these two kids talk."

The other officer, who has yet to speak a word since Goro inserted himself into their operation, finally breaks his silence. "Kimura, this has been a massive waste of time."

And Goro has only known this Kimura for all of twenty minutes, but he's not surprised in the least when he shrugs off his partner's negative attitude and continues to grin at them like an indulgent fool.

"I'll cover for you, Akechi-kun—" Goro has to try very hard not to grimace when the man claps him on the shoulder in a completely unearned display of camaraderie. "You go talk to your girlfr— I mean, your friend."

Goro is, quite honestly, reaching the end of his rope at this point. Maybe it's because he knows Ren is already far away (and hopefully safe), or maybe he's just out of practice, but either way, this particular charade is starting to feel… difficult to maintain.

Yoshizawa looks flustered enough for both of them, at least.

There's another couple of awkward seconds as Goro thanks them, and then he and Yoshizawa take turns bowing in a respectful gesture that neither man deserves, before they're finally alone.

"Let's find somewhere a little more discreet to talk, yes?"

Yoshizawa looks around them, as if she's only just registering that they're completely surrounded by people, and nods. They end up finding a spot that's at least slightly out of the way of the crowds, over near an old newspaper kiosk, one that looks like it hasn't been in use for months.

"Who were those men?" she asks, surprising Goro by not asking him about why, or how, he's here first.

"Police," Goro answers, reaching up to loosen his tie a little. "Although I'm not sure what branch specifically. They were trying to tail Ren, so I, ah, redirected them."

"I bumped into Senpai. Just as he was getting on the train…" She pauses to brush her bangs back out of her eyeline. "I don't think he knew he was being followed."

It feels unnecessary to explain everything about the van and the sedan outside, so he just agrees. "No, he didn't."

"Um, Akechi-san…" she trails off and frowns down at her shoes, clearly unsure how to phrase her next question, and Goro doesn't really blame her. As topics go, it's a slightly awkward one to bring up.

And perhaps it's because she got him out of the difficult situation that he'd been caught in only a few minutes ago, but Goro's feeling magnanimous, and he decides to help the conversation along.

"It turns out — despite all the evidence to the contrary — that I never actually died," he explains. Realising, as he does, that he doesn't actually know how much she's aware of what happened in the engine room. Or the events leading up to it, for that matter. "It's an oversimplification, but essentially, I was trapped in a place similar to the Metaverse. I've only just been able to return."

Yoshizawa blinks owlishly up at him a handful of times, but recovers quickly (considering what she herself has been through in the last year, his situation probably seems tame by comparison), and her shocked expression morphs into something more like concern. "Does Senpai know that you're alive?"

Ah, he'd forgotten about her little crush on Ren.

Another thing he can't really blame her for.

"Yes, Yoshizawa-san, he knows," Goro says carefully. He doesn't want to be needlessly cruel to this girl. Not when she could just as easily find out about his relationship with Ren from someone who's better equipped to comfort her in the aftermath. "I've actually spent the last couple of days with Ren and his friends."

"Oh… I wish I hadn't been away. It sounds like you all had fun."

"You could say that, yes," Goro admits, coughing lightly into his fist, and hopes it covers the smile trying to form on his face.

She answers him with a smile of her own that shows that he wasn't especially successful in hiding how he was feeling.

Faith, the voice in the back of his mind whispers, and Goro adds it to the list.

"I'd invite you to come have lunch with me, Yoshizawa-san," he lies, but it's a harmless, white thing, said only to make things easier between them. "But I am actually supposed to be meeting with someone to discuss some legal business…"

"Oh! Of course!" she cries, maybe a little too loudly for how close they are, and the fact that they're indoors. "It was really nice to see you again, Akechi-san, and I'm very glad you're not, um, stuck in the Metaverse anymore."

"As am I," he chuckles, and reaches out to shake her hand. "Hopefully, we'll see each other again soon."

Yoshizawa's grip is stronger than he expected it to be, wiry muscle hidden somewhere in those skinny arms, and he can feel the calluses on her fingers. He hadn't been too enthused about the idea of sitting down to lunch with her (not without Ren there to play her off, at least), but maybe it wouldn't be so bad to invite her bouldering sometime.

After all, Theodore had said that his new power could only ever be as strong as the bonds he forges.

She gives him a small wave before she turns and starts moving with the rest of the crowd, and Goro returns it absent-mindedly as he pulls his phone out of his pocket to check the time. Hoping that his little detour hasn't accidentally left Sae waiting.

It's 2:49 p.m.

There's still ten minutes before he's supposed to meet her outside the station, which is a relief. In addition to that, though, Goro is realising that he'd almost forgotten about the message he received earlier.

He was correct in thinking it was Ren, anyway, and he taps the push notification at the top of his screen as he turns and starts walking towards the exit that opens onto Station Square.

-Ren Amamiya-
19/03/2017
2:33 p.m.

Ren: Are you okay?
Ren: How many of those guys are there?

Goro rolls his eyes, slightly offended (and yes, also more than a little pleased) that Ren was worried about him, and starts typing a reply.

2:52 p.m

Goro: More than you and your friends had accounted for, clearly.
Goro: Have you seen anything that would lead you to believe that any others followed you onto the train?

It takes less than a minute for his messages to show up as read, and for Ren to start typing.

Ren: Maybe?
Ren: I saw a couple of shady looking guys
Ren: They weren't wearing suits and sunglasses though
Ren: Maybe they were just giving me the stink eye because they saw I had Morgana with me?

Goro frowns down at his screen, a little seed of worry sprouting in his chest.

Goro: Where are these men now? Are they still watching you?

Ren: Oh, no, I'm in the van with everyone now
Ren: Ann said they saw you when they were driving here
Ren: They wanted to give me a ride home
Ren: But those guys were following me and I got on the train
Ren: Makoto drove ahead to meet me at the next stop instead

Goro exhales.

In relief, yes, but there's also another unpleasant and very familiar emotion bubbling behind his breastbone.

There's no point in lying to himself about it.

He's jealous.

Which is a stupid, irrational thing to feel, he knows. Even if they had a reason to invite him along, he also happens to be very much aware of just how uncomfortable (both literally and figuratively) it is to be jammed into a small, sweaty van with all of the Phantom Thieves.

So he pushes it down, grateful that he doesn't have to look Ren in the eye while he does it, and types out a reply.

Goro: Stay on your guard. Watch out for suspicious looking vehicles on the road.

Ren: We'll be careful, don't worry
Ren: I'll call you when I get home, okay?

Goro: Please do.
Goro: And Ren?

Ren: Yeah?

He desperately wants to write an 'I love you'. Wants it to come as easily as it seems to for Ren. But his fingers don't appear to want to cooperate, and he ends up typing a meaningless platitude instead.

Goro: Enjoy yourself.

Goro closes his eyes, counts back from ten, opens them again, and reminds himself that it would be counterproductive to throw his phone across the square.

Ren: I will
Ren: Wish you could be here too though
Ren: I love you

The strangest mixture of vindication, shame, and love swells up in his chest, and he wonders if he's ever going to be able to be normal about this.

Goro: I love you too.

"Akechi-kun…?"

Caught off guard again, Goro pulls his phone in close to his chest in a quick, panicky motion. He can feel his cheeks burning, like he just got caught looking at pornography.

Sae Niijima is standing in front of him, wearing something other than a suit for what's probably the first time in Goro's memory — still cutting an impressive figure without it, of course — in an expensive-looking black sweater, grey slacks, and her usual imposing heels. She's watching him with raised eyebrows, an amused and slightly concerned expression on her face. It's understandable, given the foolish way he just reacted.

The little voice is back.

Temperance, is what it has to say this time.

He really needs to source a book on the subject and start trying to figure out the significance, if any, of all these arcana.

"Am I interrupting something?"

"No, no, it's fine," Goro laughs awkwardly, unsure himself of how fake it is even as it tumbles out of his mouth. "Thank you for coming to see me."

"It's the least that I can do, Akechi-kun. I'm just glad that you're okay."

He's had a glimpse of this sentiment already, of course, in the handful of texts they've exchanged since everything got turned on its head, but to hear, and see it in person… How sincere, and genuinely relieved she is. Goro would probably find himself rendered speechless if he hadn't already planned out what he was going to say next. "Sae-san, before we get to anything else, I want to apologise."

Tilting her head to the side, the afternoon sun glints off the earring hanging from her one visible ear. "For what?"

"The way that I treated you, particularly in November. I won't make excuses for my behaviour, but I want you to know that I regret it — how I acted."

Sae's silent for a second, evaluating him like he's seen her do a hundred times with opposing attorneys and witnesses, and he wonders if she's going to tell him that he doesn't need to apologise.

"Apology accepted," she says instead. Ah, he shouldn't have doubted her. They're both extremely similar in this respect, after all. "And I do hope you'll accept mine — I'm sorry for not noticing that something was wrong earlier. It was my responsibility, but I was too focused on my own issues, and ultimately, I know that I failed you."

He doesn't agree necessarily, but he understands why she feels the way she does, so Goro just nods and swallows around the lump in his throat, not trusting himself to speak otherwise.

Shifting her weight from one leg to the other, one hand goes to her hip as she looks him up and down. "You know… you seem different, Akechi-kun."

"Do I?"

"Hmm, happier? Maybe?" she hums, a little too-knowingly. Amusement glittering in her eyes as she zeroes in on the half-frame and partial-arm of the glasses that Goro knows are just visible at the opening of his breast pocket.

Goro grimaces, and her smile widens. "Your sister told you, didn't she?"

"About you and Amamiya-kun? Yes, she did." Sae adjusts the strap of the purse hanging from her shoulder and continues on without waiting for a response. Which is good, because Goro's not sure that he could say anything without making even more of a fool of himself. "We have a lot to talk about. Let's discuss the details over sushi — my treat."

Hardly having touched the plate of curry in Leblanc at lunchtime (for many reasons), the idea of sitting down with Sae for an early dinner is an extremely attractive one. His eagerness must be plain on his face, because she gives him that fond (sisterly, his brain provides, before he can tell it to shut up) look again before turning away and starting to walk.

Sae has always had a knack for cutting through Tokyo's crowds like a hot knife through butter, and Goro still struggles to keep step with her, despite having the height advantage. It's why he doesn't realise that they've already passed the conveyor belt sushi restaurant that they used to frequent in Shibuya until they're literally at the door of a traditional (and far more expensive) one.

He's not so naïve that he thinks her salary didn't take a substantial cut when she changed career paths. "Oh, Sae-san, I don't think—"

"I had a favour I could call in, don't worry about it." She waves a dismissive hand at him as she pushes open the door with the other. "And I kept putting it off before — bringing you somewhere nice."

And then it was too late, she doesn't say.

She doesn't have to.

"If you insist…"

"I do," she says firmly, making it clear that the discussion is over.

The interior of the restaurant is all warm, dark wood and black leather, and the lighting is just dim enough that when they take their seats at a table in the corner, Goro knows that there won't be any risk of the other patrons catching a glimpse of the documentation that he needs to go over with Sae.

Once the server has taken their drink orders and double-checked that they're fine with the chef's choice (which is only a formality, Goro knows), they're alone again. Sae doesn't waste any time cutting right to the heart of the matter.

"How much do you know about the charges that we were able to bring against Shido in the end?"

Unsurprisingly, he hasn't had any real opportunity to look into it. Not in this reality. And who knows how accurate Maruki's delusion had been when it came to this particular matter. "Not nearly enough."

"At first, it was only standard political fraud — election laws that were broken, irregularities in funding, etcetera—" Goro finds himself nodding along as she speaks. "And a lot of what he confessed to cannot be proven in a court of law, obviously."

Goro decides to keep his own failed plan to turn himself in for crimes that were just as, if not more, unprovable, to himself.

"But about two weeks ago, there was a big break in the case. The yakuza cleaner that Shido named in his confession was finally found, and with that man's arrest, I've been told that Shido may now be charged with murder directly, or at the very least, 'conspiracy to commit murder', several times over."

Gooseflesh breaks out on his arms as cold fingers walk their way up his spine. "For which murders specifically?"

"Ah, well," Sae starts, so delicately that Goro knows that his gut feeling is almost certainly correct. "Shido was very clear in his testimony that he used his underworld connections to have anyone he considered an obstacle to his political goals removed. He has conspicuously and consistently maintained that there was no one else involved, in fact."

He shouldn't be surprised.

The remorse, the anguish, the sickening tendency towards self-sacrifice — it all fits perfectly with what Goro already knows about the wretched husks that are left behind after a change of heart.

Still, he clearly wasn't as prepared for this possibility as he thought he was, because he's reeling in his seat, and when he reaches out for his glass of water, his hand is trembling so violently that he hurries to fold it together with the other one in his lap instead.

Fuck!

"Akechi-kun, you don't owe him a thing."

"I know that!" he hisses, and immediately regrets it, eyes snapping up from where they were glued to the table, to Sae's face, and back down again. "Sorry, I — sorry."

Sae, for her part, doesn't seem offended (or surprised) by his reaction. "Do you need a moment?"

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Don't snap at people who are only trying to fucking help.

"No, I'm fine," he grits out, knowing that he sounds anything but. "It was just a… shock. Please, continue."

She regards him silently for a few more seconds, taking a measured sip of her own water before she speaks again. "I won't pretend to understand how you're feeling, Akechi-kun," she says, "but the important takeaway here, I think, is that you've been given a second chance. In more ways than one."

"Does he know?" Goro blurts out, before he can think better of it, and realises immediately that he's being about as clear as mud. "About who I am?"

Sae is still watching him carefully, but without any obvious pity, at least. "He's mentioned to me that he had suspicions about your relationship, yes, and it would have been confirmed for him once his attorney read through Amamiya-kun's testimony."

Shido knew — had probably always known — and Goro hadn't had a fucking clue!

If he'd held any remaining delusions about whether his revenge plan could have ever been successful, well, they've been well and truly dashed now.

Goro is spared from having to come up with an acceptable way to put what he's thinking into words when their food is brought to the table. The previously cheery server picks up on the tense atmosphere immediately, bowing and removing herself from the situation so quickly that Goro has to wonder what they must look like to her. Did she assume that she walked into the middle of a family squabble? A lover's tiff?

Certainly something far more mundane than Goro having an existential crisis about his shitty fucking asshole of a father trying to spare his poor, pathetic, illegitimate son from being implicated in multiple supernatural murders.

And he can't even try to spin it as Shido trying to weasel his way back into his good graces, either, because the man doesn't even know that he's alive!

Sae clears her throat and delicately pinches a piece of sashimi between her chopsticks. "There is, of course, also the matter of some of the smaller crimes you haven't quite escaped being implicated in."

At least he'd been expecting that, and Goro clings to the change in topic like a drowning man to a life-raft. "Ah yes, all that lovely, illegal grunt work."

"It's not nothing, of course, legally speaking, but given your age, and circumstances… Let's just say that I'd be very surprised if you have to do more than provide a statement — and I can handle the vast majority of the details, as your attorney."

Goro was reaching for a piece of sushi, his hand finally steady enough for him to trust it to hold his chopsticks, but he sets them down beside his platter again, and huffs a low, disbelieving laugh. "I am very, very sure that I cannot afford your services, Sae-san."

"Doing the occasional pro bono case looks good for a new firm. That's just smart marketing," she says dismissively. "And well, if you're having trouble accepting that — and I can see, already, that you are…" She chuckles as Goro's frown deepens into a scowl. "I also have a small favour to ask — or more, I have a favour to ask on behalf of a friend."

It's probably unfair of him, but he's immediately suspicious. "A favour?"

"It would only be a meeting; you don't have to commit to anything up front—"

Oh, he was definitely right to be wary. "Sae-san, please. What is this about?"

"How familiar are you with the Kirijo Group?"

Goro doesn't know what he was expecting, but it wasn't that.

"If you're asking if I'm aware that they have their own cognitive psience research division, then yes, I am relatively familiar."

They were one of the few groups in the field that Shido had never been able to threaten or bully out of existence, in fact, and when he'd exhausted all of his other options, and sent Goro into Mementos to find their shadows… There had been no sign of them. Not even a blip on the Meta-nav. It was like their shadows had never existed in the first place.

At the time, Goro assumed that they had developed some kind of safeguarding technology, something that protected them from cognitive interference, and that does still seem like the most likely explanation (especially for the rank-and-file researchers), but now, with the benefit of hindsight, he has to wonder about how many of them had actually been Persona-users.

"Their president was my underclassman in university," Sae explains, and Goro already has an idea about where she's going with this. Saying that he's less than thrilled would be an understatement. "We've been back in touch since the end of last year — when I started trying to push for legal recognition of Shido's Metaverse-related crimes — and my understanding is that her company can help people with your abilities find more legitimate applications for them." She pauses and obviously misinterprets the sour look on his face as hurt or betrayal, because she quickly moves to reassure him. "Don't worry, I haven't spoken to her about the fact that you're back — and I never would without your explicit permission — but I know that she would be very interested in speaking with you."

"I'm not, ah, exactly in a hurry to get back to doing someone else's dirty work in the Metaverse, Sae-san."

"I think you'll find that not everyone is like Shido, Akechi-kun," she sighs, and then frowns when Goro snorts under his breath, leaning back in her seat and crossing her arms disapprovingly. "Makoto told me that you want to try to make up for what happened. I would have thought that you'd be more receptive to an opportunity to do just that."

Goro is all set to refuse outright, maybe even float the idea of picking up some community service as an alternative, when Sae's choice of words sinks in. It's like a physical snag — a tug — on a recent memory. Pulling it back up to the surface like a fish on a line.

What was it that Theodore had said?

That he should endeavour to be receptive, even when his instincts might indicate otherwise?

Well, shit.

Perhaps he was being slightly uncharitable when he assumed that Theodore was being far too opaque to be useful.

"Fine… I'll take her number."

"It really will just be a meeting," she says, already pulling a business card out of the small case in her purse. The cardstock is expensive and tasteful, with the Kirijo Group logo in the top left corner, and Mitsuru Kirijo's information printed neatly along the bottom right. "I wouldn't make the suggestion if I didn't trust her, or if I didn't think it would be a good fit for you."

A petty, nasty, spiteful little thought creeps up on him, and he comes very close to asking when exactly she's planning on making the same recommendation to her younger sister. Despite being well aware of how unfair it would be — their circumstances are not the same, and it would be ridiculous for him to pretend otherwise.

Makoto Niijima, and the rest of the Phantom Thieves, for that matter, have done nothing to preclude them from living perfectly normal lives now.

And, fate and destiny aside, he does trust Sae's judgement.

"By the way, Sae-san, I didn't come to this meeting empty-handed — I have some documents with me that you might find useful."

A bright spark of interest flickers in her eyes. "Oh?"

Once he opens his attaché case and passes the envelopes to her, they begin comparing notes in earnest, and some of the tension between them dissipates. Slipping into a familiar and comfortable rhythm, with their paperwork spread out on the table between them as they finally tuck into their food properly.

The sushi is delicious, but maybe not quite as satisfying as knowing that the evidence he's provided is almost certainly going to be instrumental in the arrest of two high-ranking conspiracy members.

Eventually, though, their platters are empty, they've gone through everything, and Goro has to accept that he needs to hand over the last thing that he has to offer. Placing the black case on the table carefully, and with a gravity that appears to tip Sae off to its contents immediately. Which works out well, he'd prefer not to broadcast it.

"Is that what I think it is?"

Goro simply nods.

She eyes the case warily for a second before reaching out to pull it across the table, slowly and gingerly, like it's a bomb. He can empathise. "You did the right thing — bringing it to me."

"Do you think it might be useful to the investigation?"

"Honestly? I can't say…" She starts to chew her lip and catches herself before she completely ruins her lipstick. "I do know that I don't like the idea of it being out in the world, and particularly in the hands of a minor... It needs to be locked away. Somewhere safe."

"I couldn't agree more," Goro admits, even as the 'minor' comment rankles him.

Sae slides the case into her purse, exhaling in shaky relief once it's out of sight again. Then, she drains her glass and checks her watch. "Have you got somewhere to stay?"

This is, essentially, the second time he's been asked this question today, and he's slightly more prepared for it this time. It doesn't change the fact that he hates feeling like — and coming across as — a helpless fucking child. "I have some money. Enough to stay in a hotel for a week — maybe two…" If he doesn't mind staying in a complete shithole, that is, of course. "But I haven't arranged anything more permanent… Although, I do have a couple of potential options."

"Well," Sae starts, sounding far more pleased with herself than Goro was expecting. Is there something he's missing here? "I have actually already spoken, a little, with a concerned third party about your situation."

Realisation hits him like a slap to the face. "Sojiro Sakura," Goro almost whispers, in complete and utter disbelief.

"The very same," she nods, "and, between the two of us, I think we can figure something out."

He's going to blame Ren for breaking (or fixing, depending on your perspective, he supposes) his goddamn tear-ducts because his eyes and nose are burning now. The only thing that's stopping him from breaking down entirely is the sudden, and hilarious, deer-in-the-headlights look on Sae's face when she realises that she might have to comfort him.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to start blubbering all over you, Sae-san," he laughs, and it might come out slightly rougher than he'd have liked it to, but it's enough, and she laughs too, relaxing in her seat again.

"I won't stop you if you still want to get a hotel for tonight," she says as she gathers and tidies the papers on the table, sliding them all back into their respective envelopes. "But I do have a spare futon, and plenty of space on the floor in my living room—"

"Sae-san…" he protests, even though he can already feel himself giving in.

"And honestly, Akechi-kun," she continues, ignoring him entirely. "You look like you could use the rest — you look exhausted, in fact…" The small, genuine smile on her face has taken on a mischievous quirk, and Goro thinks he knows exactly what's coming next. He braces himself. It's not like he doesn't deserve it. "How did you put it? Stress is the enemy of beauty?"

Chapter Text

On the day that they all drive back to Ren's hometown, Morgana isn't quite sure what to make of the place.

Kanbara is a small town, and all around it, there's just so much space — with wide open fields on one side and a flat spread of ocean that stretches as far as the eye can see on the other. It makes Morgana feel a little exposed, and maybe actually kind of nervous? He's seen the countryside in movies and TV shows, of course, but it hadn't really prepared him for what it was actually like, or even for just how different the air is. Underneath the smell of the ocean and the fresh fish in the market, it's just clearer, cleaner, and leaves his nose feeling overstimulated and twitchy.

He kind of misses having the smog to mute everything else.

They drive right up to Ren's house (small, detached, and at the end of a long, gravel driveway), and his parents are already waiting for them when they get there. Both standing in the doorway and smiling.

Morgana wriggles out of Futaba's lap and jumps up onto Ren's shoulder as the van comes to a stop, and they all start piling out.

"Man, I really gotta take a leak," Ryuji groans and then breaks into a yawn, stretching his arms above his head, before having to do a one-legged hop to the side to avoid the finger jab that Futaba aims at his ribs.

"Gross, Ryuji."

"So vulgar," Morgana agrees, nodding sagely.

"Wha?!" he squawks and then grumbles, "Everybody's gotta piss!"

"He's not wrong," Ren says, and even Ann shrugs and nods.

"Regardless," Makoto chimes in, clearing her throat as she presses the button on the key fob in her hand to lock the van. "Maybe now isn't the best time to have this conversation?"

She tilts her chin towards the other end of the garden, and they all turn to see the Amamiyas making their way up the driveway towards them.

Ren's dad is the first to greet them. "Good afternoon. I'm Fujio Amamiya, and this is my wife…" The woman beside him steps forward and dips into a quick, shallow bow. "Nadeshiko."

"Thank you for taking care of our son."

And while everyone else fumbles and stutters through their own awkward introductions, Morgana takes the opportunity to give Ren's parents a once-over.

The first thing that stands out to him is that Ren really takes after his mom.

They have the same thick, wavy hair (although hers is way longer, pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck), the same jawline, and the same intense eyes that soften when she smiles.

By comparison, Ren's dad doesn't really look like his son, but there's still something about the way he holds himself, and the set of his mouth, that makes their relationship obvious anyway. Both of his parents are tall, and younger looking than Morgana was expecting (even though he's sure they must be in their forties, at least), and first impressions don't always mean a lot, but they seem normal.

They seem nice.

Morgana looks around at the rest of his friends and knows they're all probably thinking the same thing, waiting for the switch to flip and for Ren's mom and dad to do or say something that explains why he never talks about them, ever.

It doesn't happen.

Well, nothing jumps out at Morgana as they make small talk with his friends, anyway. Or when Ryuji — and then everyone else — has to duck inside the house to use the bathroom.

Ren's mom and Haru drift over to the flower beds at the side of the driveway while they wait, striking up a conversation about what sounds like the best kind of fertiliser, as Ren's dad talks to Makoto about what the traffic was like on the drive up.

And Ren? He stays pretty quiet the entire time, but that's normal enough, and Morgana isn't sure if he should be reading into it.

Then, once all the toilet breaks are taken care of, it's finally time to say goodbye.

Ann, Futaba, and Haru are crying openly as they each hug Ren and Morgana in turn, and Ryuji's eyes are wet too — his mouth all twisted up like he's been sucking on a lemon candy. Morgana makes sure to bump his forehead extra hard against his friend's when he leans in to sling an arm around Ren's shoulders.

Yusuke hugs them both so forcefully that Morgana's pretty sure he hears something in Ren's neck pop out of place, and then pop back again when Makoto does the same thing.

Morgana would like to say that he's better at keeping it together, but really, it's only because crying is something his real-world body isn't actually able to do.

For a moment, the calm country air is filled with the sound of Ann, Futaba, Ryuji, and even Haru yelling their goodbyes out the open windows of the van as it turns and makes its way back down the driveway.

Then it's quiet.

And they're gone.

Nadeshiko Amamiya approaches them just after the van disappears around the corner, hesitating for only a second before she presses a quick kiss to Ren's temple. She then turns her attention to Morgana.

Smiling at him softly, kindly (just like Ren does), she reaches out to run a hand over his head and down his back.

Morgana feels his tail rise up behind him like a happy, traitorous little exclamation mark.

"Why didn't you tell us you were going to be bringing a cat home with you, Ren?"

Ren shrugs, and Morgana instinctively shifts his weight to the side to compensate for the movement. "I forgot, sorry."

"How could you forget someone as important as me?" Morgana grumbles, even though he knows that Ren has to ignore him.

"It'll help teach him some responsibility," Fujio says with a dismissive little chuckle, patting Ren's other shoulder as he turns to head inside the house.

"That's true, dear — oh!" Nadeshiko exclaims, and then laughs, like she just remembered something funny. "I do hope it's housebroken, though, Ren. I've only just taken your grandmother's rug back out of storage."

It's not a very good joke, Morgana thinks, even though Ren's parents both seem to think it's hilarious, and he's starting to think it's some in-joke that he'll need to ask Ren to explain to him later, when he notices that Ren's not laughing. Not even smiling. The muscles in his jaw are clenched so tightly that Morgana can see the way they're all bunched up under his skin.

People's faces can't actually get stuck like that, right?

"Ren?"

"S'nothin," Ren says under his breath, as he follows his parents through the door.

And later, when Morgana finally has the chance to ask him about it — when they're upstairs unpacking, after Ren spent what felt like hours on the phone with Akechi, and after a very awkward family dinner — his friend just waves him off and says that he's too tired to get into it.

***

On the second day, Ren has school.

Morgana stretches out on the bed as Ren puts on his old school uniform. It's black, with a stiff, straight collar. A classic gakuran. The same kind of uniform that Morgana can remember Iwai's kid wearing.

It's formal, plain, understated, and doesn't quite fit with any of the mental images Morgana has of Ren.

Also, it's starting to look a little short around the wrists and ankles.

"Guess you grew a bit while you were in Tokyo, huh?"

"Yeah, guess so…" Ren mutters, turning a little in front of the mirror, trying to get a better look at the way the cuffs ride up as he moves. "I'll let my mom know I need a new one."

Yawning, Morgana jumps down off the bed, rubbing up against the side of Ren's leg (leaving a dusting of white fur on the black fabric as he goes) and then pauses to sniff suspiciously at the strap of the unfamiliar school bag on the floor beside them. "I still think you should let me come with you…"

"People look more closely here than they do in the city, Morgana… We just need to wait until the dust settles a little, okay?" Ren scrubs his hands through his hair, catches Morgana's eye in the mirror and smiles. "I'll be fine, don't worry."

Morgana doesn't know if that's really true, but Ren does seem okay when he comes home later, so he doesn't try to push it again.

Even though he wants to.

***

On the third day, Ren's mom is making lunch for everyone in the house — the three of them have a chore wheel and take turns with this kind of stuff (although, maybe 'turns' isn't really the right word for it, when Ren's name is attached to more than half the tasks listed there) — and she goes out of her way to keep some of the nicer cuts of fish aside for Morgana.

He tries to make his purring sound more sceptical than usual when he tucks in, but it's tough.

It's really, really good fish.

And she knows just the right spot to scratch behind his ears, too.

***

On the fourth day, Ren brings Morgana with him when he goes to pick up some groceries for dinner. It's the first time they've been outside together since they first arrived, and they're making their way back to the house in companionable silence when Morgana notices the black car following them.

"Ren!" he hisses, right into his friend's ear, even though he knows that no one else can understand what he's saying. "Don't look now, but I think those guys are back!"

"Yeah?" Ren says, and he doesn't really sound surprised — unlike Morgana, when Ren turns on his heel, looks right at the car, and waves.

The two men inside scramble to duck down in their seats, accelerating slightly, so the car isn't moving at a crawl anymore, and then disappear around the first corner they can.

"Wow, they're really bad at this," Morgana laughs, and then remembers that he should probably also be concerned. "How many times has this happened?"

"Three times now," Ren snorts, turning back to start walking towards the house again. "I kind of want to see how long it'll take for them to get bored."

***

On the fifth day, at dinner. Just when Morgana is beginning to think that things are starting to settle, and maybe even feel a little less awkward. Ren's parents insist that they need to install some tracking app on his phone.

They talk about it like it's coming from a place of love, or concern — and it probably is, a little — but Morgana's seen the dark side of enough people's hearts to know that doesn't stop it from also being controlling and wrong.

There's a tense moment, like a stand-off, before Ren sighs, unlocks his phone and slides it across the table.

Morgana isn't surprised that Ren doesn't want to talk about it, once they're back upstairs, but at least he's able to convince him to contact Futaba, so she can do whatever it is she needs to do to make it so the app doesn't actually work.

After she's done, Ren starts talking to her about some new game that he wants to play with her, now that he has his PC back, sidestepping her awkward attempts to ask if he's okay or needs to talk as easily as Morgana has seen him dodge attacks in the Metaverse.

They're only five days in.

Summer can't come soon enough.

***

On the sixth day (or more, the sixth night), Ren is fast asleep, and Morgana is climbing back through the window on the upstairs landing after going for a short walk, when he overhears a snippet of a hushed conversation between Ren's parents downstairs.

"—different now, isn't he?"

"It's been a year, Nadeshiko. Most kids would change a lot in that time."

"Yes, but it's… It's nothing, never mind."

There's a pause, and the soft, muffled clink of dishes being moved around in the sink as they wash up.

"You sound like you're afraid of him."

The pause is longer this time.

"Aren't you?"

***

On the seventh day, Morgana and Ren are getting ready to watch a movie on the big TV downstairs (because Ren's parents are both out for the evening), when the doorbell rings.

It's a girl.

She's about Ren's age, short (probably only an inch taller than Futaba), and pretty, with shiny, dark hair pulled into a pair of braids that just brush her shoulders.

"You can't keep avoiding me, Ren," she says, and Morgana's ears flick and twitch at the way she not only uses Ren's given name, but how she also forgoes any sort of honorific. "I know that sounds dumb… since I ghosted you, and all, but I had to, my dad—"

"Hitomi, it's fine." Ren's voice is gentle and calm, but Morgana knows him — can hear the tension, and the hurt, underneath clear as day. "Really."

If this girl picks up on how Ren is actually feeling, she doesn't show it. Immediately relaxing and smiling in relief. "Then can we—"

"I met someone else. In Tokyo. It's pretty serious."

Flinching, her eyes go wide. "O-oh…"

They all stand there for a few more seconds, painful silence hanging heavily in the air, as Hitomi struggles to find something else to say, Ren just leans against the door frame and plays with his bangs, and Morgana regrets following him out here in the first place.

Eventually, she gives up and stammers her way through a shaky goodbye.

Morgana watches her walk down the driveway, awkward and dejected, until she's out of sight and Ren moves to close the door. "You had a girlfriend?"

"Don't sound too surprised," Ren laughs, already walking towards the kitchen. Morgana runs after him — a million questions on the tip of his tongue that he knows he's never going to get an answer to. "C'mon, I'm gonna put some popcorn in the microwave… and, y'know, I'm pretty sure I saw some of Dad's fancy tuna in the fridge earlier, too."

***

On the eight day, Ren is sitting at his desk, 'studying' (really, he's staring off into space, balancing on the rear legs of his chair, and doing that trick where he makes a coin dance across the back of his fingers) while Morgana cleans his tail.

"Morgana?"

It's hard to answer someone when you've got a mouth full of fur, so all Morgana manages to get out is a muffled "Mrp?"

"I was thinking… You know the way everyone said they had dreams about Goro, just before he came back?"

Oh, okay, he was wondering if this was going to come up. "Yeah?"

Ren flicks his thumb and sends the coin flying into the air, catching it between his index and middle fingers as it comes back down. "You never said what yours was about."

"Um, well… Haru never told us what hers was either, y'know…"

"That bad, huh?"

Morgana winces, swallows the last of the hair in his mouth, and sits up properly. There's no point in playing evasive, not when Ren's looking at him like that, anyway.

"You know how I woke up in Mementos — before I met you and Ryuji in Kamoshida's Palace?" Ren nods, so Morgana continues. "It's fuzzy… I don't really remember how long I was wandering around in there, or from Palace to Palace, or even when exactly Yaldabaoth forced itself into Igor-sama's role… but in my dream? I knew it was a long time ago — years — and, uh, I still found a kid while I was searching for answers, but…"

"But it wasn't me, or Ryuji."

Morgana closes his eyes and thinks about the boy in his dream, a full head shorter than he had been when they actually met him in the TV studio, scared and angry, but also so relieved to have someone to help — someone to guide him. "No…"

Ren doesn't say anything right away, just turns the coin over in his hands again, rubbing his thumb over each side carefully. "Is that what was supposed to happen? Were you supposed to find Goro instead?"

"No… I don't think so," Morgana says, shaking his head, because even if his memory of everything about that time is still jumbled and unclear, he has this feeling in his gut, or his heart.

He knows that he was made to help Ren.

"Huh…" Ren shifts his weight forward, so that all four of the legs of his chair are on the floor, as he moves to rest his elbows on the desk and his chin in his hands. "I wonder how things would've turned out."

"Yeah, me too…"

Morgana's put a lot of thought into it, honestly, ever since the dream, but he doesn't have any real answers.

Could he have helped Akechi, and then gone on to recruit Ren, and Ryuji, and everyone else, before defeating Shido? Maybe. Maybe no one would have had to die.

Maybe everything would have been better.

For everyone.

Or maybe Yaldabaoth would have isolated Ren instead.

***

On the ninth day, Morgana is half-asleep on the windowsill of Ren's bedroom, in what has to be the most perfect ray of sunshine, when Ren walks into the room.

He's talking on the phone. Morgana can hear Akechi's voice, loud and clear, on the other end of the line. And this is when he'd normally jump up to give them some privacy, but he's just so comfy.

And it's not really eavesdropping if Ren knows he's in the room, right?

Pushing his paws against the warm glass, Morgana flexes his claws sleepily. Maybe he can stay here and rest, just for another few minutes…

At least until they start being gross, anyway.

"—six months of probation is a slap on the wrist, really, considering everything I've done."

"Mmm, I guess so," Ren hums, and Morgana's ears twitch at the sound of him flopping down onto the bed behind him. "Is Niijima-san going to be working with your probation officer?"

Oh yeah, that was Sojiro's job while Ren was still on his probation, right?

"Yes, and no… Apparently, it would be too much of a conflict of interest for my attorney to also serve as my guardian during the probationary period… Of course, my new circumstances will mean I'll have to learn how to make a cup of coffee, but you never did make it seem all that difficult."

The realisation hits Morgana at about the same time that it obviously does Ren.

"You're going to be staying—"

"In Leblanc, yes. Congratulations, you've connected the dots." Morgana hears Ren snort a small, affectionate laugh, and thinks about how much he still doesn't get their whole thing. "It looks like choosing the café as the place to store my belongings has worked out quite well."

"Yeah…" There's a beat, and then Ren does this fake, dramatic gasp. Morgana covers his face with his paws. "Wait, does this mean I'm dating attic trash?"

Morgana's sensitive ears pick up the low, monotonous beeping of the call being disconnected before Ren laughs again. Louder, and in real disbelief this time.

"He hung up on you, huh?"

"Yep," Ren says simply, and Morgana can hear the grin in his voice. Just like he can hear the dial tone as Ren calls Akechi back.

Maybe he should get up and see what the sun's like downstairs in the living room, after all.